Meet the Spirit of Dakota nominees

The Spirit of Dakota committee has released the 11 nominees for this year’s Spirit of Dakota Award.
Each of these 11 spirited women exemplify courage to face challenges, imagination to solve problems, dedication to community and family, leadership with cooperation, and a love of life. They have been justly nominated by supporters in their communities for this prestigious award.
One of them will receive one of the highest honors extended to women in the state of South Dakota on Oct. 7. She will be named the 31st Spirit of Dakota winner at a special awards ceremony and banquet at the Huron Event Center.
Let’s meet this year’s nominees, in alphabetical order.

Betty Belkham
“Oklahoma, where the winds come sweepin’ down the plains…” sent Betty Belkham up north to South Dakota, for which many are deeply grateful. She dedicated years of service as a teacher, principal, superintendent, and all-activities supporter, at Lower Brule Grant System, Flandreau Public, Todd County School and Cheyenne-Eagle Butte School.
Betty was elected President of the North American Indian Women’s Association, and began with Winyan Omniciye Group. “Although she is a petite woman, she is 10-feet tall to many,” reads one of her nominations. “Her commitment to mentoring, advising and encouraging students, as well as her sons and grandchildren, means her influence has gone out from South Dakota to our whole nation, and even back to Oklahoma.”

Vivian Dobberpuhl
Out of desolation and pain can come dedication and perseverance. Vivian Dobberpuhl, always an active church and community member, was able to turn her intense grief and mourning for her four-year-old grandson into a farm safety program which she offers at farm and home shows, county fairs, 4-H groups and at the Gypsy Day Parade. She studied and learned to present interesting and interactive lessons for children about farm safety. She goes anywhere she is asked to present.
There are no statistics for children saved from deadly consequences of farm accidents, but Vivian’s faith has driven her and sustained her in this mission for decades.

Genie Ellis
After serving four decades in the United States Indian Health Service, Genie Ellis doesn’t appear to be losing steam. Instead she is like the tea kettle ready to sound the alarm and advocate for her patients despite health care barriers, economic challenges, problems requiring creative solutions, and the many miles of South Dakota roads she travels.
In addition to a desire to be “proudest grandma and mother”, she is friend, mentor and support to many co-workers and patients, and a role model and instructor to the next generation. “Grace and grit are the hallmarks of her interactions with everyone she meets” according to CAPT Mary R. Ingram, PhD, RN, FNP-BC.

Rita Fraune
“You never let me down,” said Wanda Aaberg, Director of the Fall River County Historical Society’s Pioneer Museum, about Rita Fraune. Rita is always willing to volunteer on weekends and organizes collections based on her years of knowledge as an antique dealer. Her expertise also helps her chair the St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church’s annual yard sale. And there’s the Friends of the Library Labor Day Tri-Athlon and its Book Barn fundraiser, while also acting as the director of the Ministerial Association’s Food Pantry in Hot Springs. When asked about volunteering, her response is  invariably, “Yes, I can do that.”
Her dream of working with The Wild Horse Sanctuary brought Rita to Hot Springs in 2004, after three decades of living in St. Louis , Mo., as a teacher. Her dream expanded to working in retirement with her new community and neighbors for the past 13 years.

Esther Gilchrist
“Esther is the longest tenured and oldest (at 88) member in the Beadle County Extension Clubs” is proudly repeated by co-workers, friends and family. She was RSVP’s Volunteer of 2015 for logging more than 4,000 hours. Esther received the UMW Special Mission Recognition. She received The Order of the Rose Award in 2005 by Delta Kappa Gamma, an international society for Women Educators, after teaching at the Hitchcock School for 23 years.
So, to take it easier, Esther Eckmann Gilchrist works out at the Hitchcock Fitness Center at least three times a week, encouraging and inspiring younger ones to fully embrace health and wellness, and gives line dancing classes. With gardening activities she has plants and flowers to share with sick, injured or shut-ins who need someone with her boundless energy and beautiful smile. As do we all.

Bernice Hufford Guy
“Gotta jump down, turn around, pick a bale of cotton…” if you were Bernice Hufford Guy as a child. Her years stayed so busy working that she finally got her GED at age 60. Bernice became an entrepreneur, selling Tupperware, opening a women’s clothing store in Veblen, and started a blue jeans factory. Time took a hard toll on her veteran husband who needed constant Alzheimer’s care until his death. Bernice bore the sorrows and fought her own battle with cancer.
Through it all she had her hands full of dishes of food and pies for others, (the best potato salad), and a song to sing. She plays her guitar and harmonica regularly volunteering with her music. She’s filled nine decades of working, giving and living for all those around her.

Ashley Kingdon Reese
“Passionate about care and compassionate about people” is the motto of Independent Health Solutions of Huron, founded by Ashley Kingdon Reese. She is totally dedicated to solving problems that keep her patients improving their health and quality of life. She has 12 employees and services Huron, Lake Preston, Wessington Springs, Cavour, De Smet and other nearby communities. She works to educate patients and others about how to use health enhancement technology and how to make better decisions in eating at social situations. (This includes forming bowling leagues and teaching skills for spares to her patients.) She is following her passion for problem solving in health care challenges.

Avis Little Eagle
“Wanting to pursue a career seeking out and reporting on truth and justice is a noble goal that many feel in their hearts but few actually get out in the world and make it happen.” Avis Little Eagle has fulfilled this goal since beginning to work at the Lakota Times and then Indian Country Today since 1981, according to Tim Giago. Her 10-part series on “False Indian Medicine Men and Women” pushed a small weekly newspaper based in Rapid City into the national eye. During last year’s resistance to the Dakota Access Pipeline, her articles looked at all sides of the issues, while she exposed the unaccountability of money raised by some of the occupiers.
She has five children, 12 grandchildren, and her own newspaper to own and edit, The Teton Times, serving the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation for years. Her quest for truth and justice through the public voice is inspiring to many young people looking for their way into the future.

Ruth Neuberger
We sometimes wonder if they’re really farmers, who have booths at farmers markets. There’s no question about Ruth Neuberger. Her work developing the Sioux Falls Farmers Market or her “Goosemobiles,” or her Lamb Cook-off Award at the Sioux Empire Fair, or her Dakota Down and Prairie Pantry businesses she started are all parts of her stay-at-home farmwife calling.
She also finds time for the Gideon’s Auxiliary, Lutheran Women’s Missionary League, starting the Priscilla Circle and other Bible study groups and helping whenever called upon in the community. And how many moms would be thrilled to be nominated for a special award by their sons?

Susan Fejfar Shrader
Being in charge of homemade noodle production for Czech Days requires a commanding persona. This person also happens to be the Commander of the Tabor American Legion Kortan-Hatwan Post. Susan Fejfar Shrader mentors town youth learning to bake kolaches for their own fund raisers as well. Professionally, this Vietnam Veteran nurse is now working in the Physicians External Peer Review Project for the VA Medical Center to enhance the care standards of our soldiers. This work positively affects thousands of our service men and women.
“She’s also a darned good painter” according to husband Steve Shrader, after she secured financing from “Paint South Dakota” for the Tabor Development Beautification Committee. They renovated, repaired and re-painted an historic Tabor home. When not at work or volunteering she’s on the road driving elderly neighbors to the Sioux Falls VA clinic or just stopping by to check on someone’s well-being, probably bringing homemade noodles or kolaches.

Jean Wilkinson
Whether giving someone CPR, singing praise music or cooking for 50 on her pastor’s five hours notice, church is a second home to Jean Wilkinson, where “Prayers go up. Blessings come down.” De Smet is also her home and she is there working at her husband’s law firm, or PTA, Meals on Wheels, De Smet Rescue, Town and Country Snowdrifters, Kingsbury County Cattlemen and S.D. Cattlemen’s Foundation.
Jean worked at De Smet Memorial Hospital for more than 20 years as an RN. Her medical expertise and knowledge carried her through the difficult times of a lung transplant, dialysis and a kidney transplant. Thankfully, she has returned to most of her activities with “strength, endurance and total faith.”

Photo courtesy of the Spirit of Dakota Committee

The members of the Spirit of Dakota committee are making final preparations for the 11 nominees, their families and guests for the 31st Spirit of Dakota Award celebration, to be held at the Huron Event Center on Saturday, Oct. 7. Shown from left are Marilyn Hoyt, the chair of the Spirit of Dakota Award, Linda Schwartz, Carol Milbrandt, Shelley Noonan, Bette Poppen, Sarah Radke, Deannie LeRoux and Mary Pearson. Not pictured, Mary Helen Wipf. For tickets, contact Mary Pearson at 352-8531 or the Huron Chamber and Visitors Bureau at 352-0000.