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Chuck Cecil is a native South Dakotan, born during the Great Depression in Wessington Springs. His family later moved to Sturgis and at the start of WW II to Rapid City where he graduated from high school in 1950.
He served four years during the Korean War as a Navy aerial photographer. Upon his discharge, he enrolled at South Dakota State University where he earned bachelor's and master's degrees in journalism. During his collegiate years he was hired by then gubernatorial candidate Ralph Herseth to be Herseth’s campaign aide, and took a leave of absence for the successful campaign. |
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After receiving his degree he joined Gov. Herseth in Pierre where he was assistant director of Highway Publicity. He then worked as a reporter for the Watertown Public Opinion for five years and as editor of the Vermillion Plain Talk for one year before joining his alma mater as Director of Development.
He worked for South Dakota State University for 22 years, serving in a number of positions, the last being Assistant to the President for three SDSU presidents.
Cecil then took early retirement, mortgaged his home and purchased the Volga Tribune newspaper. He acquired other newspapers until he published ten, retiring from that in 2000. He has since worked as a freelance writer. He writes a weekly column, "Stubble Mulch," an award-winner, for the Brookings Register, and has a daily program, "Postcards from South Dakota" on local and area radio stations. He has written fifteen books and is currently working on a book about South Dakota during the days of state and national prohibition, 1915 to 1935.
Cecil and his wife Mary have three grown children.
Dan Cecil is a medical doctor in Brookings; Matt Cecil is an associate professor of journalism and mass
communications at SDSU; Amy Cecil Holm teaches English at Augustana College in Sioux Falls. Cecil has five grandchildren. |
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