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Look Back: Iranian hostage Rocky Sickmann released, 1981
Date: 1/27/2012 Album ID: 1403450
Photos by Post-Dispatch staff photographers
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by Tim O'Neil --- On Jan. 28, 1981, Marine Corps Sgt. Rodney "Rocky" Sickmann, one of 52 Americans held hostage in Iran for 444 wrenching days, was back in Missouri. "Freedom is everything, and we have it," Sickmann, 23, shouted heartily.
Virgil and Toni Sickmann of Krakow, Mo., parents of Marine Corps Sgt. Rodney Rocky Sickmann, take part in a special Mass at their parish church on Nov. 19, 1979, for their son and 51 other Americans held hostage in Iran. The Mass was at St. Gertrude Catholic Church in Krakow, a community about five miles south of Washington, Mo. Iranians had stormed the embassy in Tehran on Nov. 4, 1979, and taken its American occupants hostage in an organized rage over President Jimmy Carter's design to allow Iran's deposed dictator, the Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to obtain cancer treatment in New York. The hostages would remain captives for 444 days. (Scott Dine/Post-Dispatch)
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Virgil and Toni Sickmann in their home in October 1980, shortly before the first anniversary of the hostage-taking. Toni Sickmann pages through a scrapbook of pictures of their son, Sgt. Rocky Sickmann. (Wayne Crosslin/Post-Dispatch)
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Toni and Virgil Sickmann and friends share joy and champagne on Jan. 19, 1981, after receiving official confirmation that the hostages would be released. The scene is on the Sickmann's front lawn in Krakow, Mo., at 8 a.m. (Renyold Ferguson/Post-Dispatch)
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Sgt. Rocky Sickmann greets 4,000 friends and well-wishers at 1:52 p.m. on Jan. 28, 1981, at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport. The hostages were flown to Algeria, then Germany, then to the United States. Sickmann's parents met him at the West Point Military Academy in New York on Jan. 25. Jill Ditch, his girlfriend, rushed him with a hug the next day at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington, D.C. Sickmann, family and friends flew to St. Louis on an Ozark Air Lines DC-9 charter jet. (Karen Elshout/Post-Dispatch)
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Well-wishers greet Sgt. Rocky Sickmann in the Lambert terminal. (Scott Dine/Post-Dispatch)
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Sgt. Rocky Sickmann speaks with reporters inside the terminal. A press conference was planned for a few minutes later at the St. Louis Airport Marriott, across Interstate 70 from the airport, but nobody could wait. (Karen Elshout/Post-Dispatch)
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Sgt. Rocky Sickmann waves to the crowd just outside the terminal. (Karen Elshout/Post-Dispatch)
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Sgt. Rocky Sickmann answers questions during the formal press conference at the Marriott. To his immediate right is Mayor James Conway. (Lynne T. Spence/Post-Dispatch)
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Sgt. Rocky Sickmann gets a hearty laugh from his family at the Marriott. With him, from right to left, are his mother, Toni; his father, Virgil; a sister, Debbie Filla; girlfriend Jill Ditch; a brother, Gene Sickmann; Sgt. Sickmann; and Bill Kimme, the family's lawyer. (Karen Elshout/Post-Dispatch)
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Friends in Krakow watch Sgt. Rocky Sickmann's press conference live on a television in the Krakow store and tavern. (Sam Leone/Post-Dispatch)
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Friends and neighbors wait on the front lawn of the Sickmann home in Krakow for Sgt. Rocky Sickmann's motorcade to arrive. (Sam Leone/Post-Dispatch)
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Sgt. Rocky Sickmann at the front door of his family's home on Jan. 28, 1981. The giant yellow ribbon formerly had been on the Planetarium in Forest Park. (Scott Dine/Post-Dispatch)
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Sgt. Rocky Sickmann says hello to a young neighbor during the festivities. (Scott Dine/Post-Dispatch)
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Jeff Klein, 8, a neighbor, stands on the Sickmann family front lawn during the welcome-home party. (Scott Dine/Post-Dispatch)
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Sgt. Rocky Sickmann and Jill Ditch on stage at Kiel Auditorium for another welcome-home rally on Feb. 15, 1981. They would become engaged two weeks later. (Larry Williams/Post-Dispatch)
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Rocky Sickmann, former Marine, with Jill Ditch, his fiancee, at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport on March 12, 1981. He had flown home from Quantico, Va., where he received an honorable discharge. (Karen Elshout/Post-Dispatch)
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Jill and Rocky Sickmann on their wedding day, Oct. 2, 1981. They were married at All Souls Catholic Church, 9550 Tennyson Avenue in Overland, where they had bought a home. One of Rocky's sisters, Judy Ehlenbeck, already was living in Overland. The Sickmanns, now of south St. Louis County, have three children and two grandchildren. Rocky Sickmann is director of military sales for Anheuser-Busch Inbev. Rocky's father, Virgil Sickmann, died April 15, 2010. His mother, Toni Sickmann, died five weeks later. (Lynn T. Spence/Post-Dispatch)
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Sgt. Rocky Sickmann waves to the crowd just outside the terminal. (Karen Elshout/Post-Dispatch)
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