Nancy Gowen
President

Biography

Nancy is a retired Early Childhood Teacher. She has taught young children and also had the privilege of being an adjunct faculty member in Early Education at Black Hills State University and Western Dakota Technical Institute. Nancy has served on several boards both regional, state and local- Midwestern Association for the Education of Young Children, South Dakota Assoc. for the Education of Young Children and the Black Hills Association for the Education of Young Children, CASA, South Dakota Voices for Children, Catholic Social Services, Black Hills Community Theatre, AAUW and Delta Kappa Gamma, Mount Rushmore Society and Mount Rushmore History Association, and Allied Arts Fund. She is married to Dr. Richard Gowen and has five children, 11 grandchildren, and 3 great-grand children. Gardening, reading with her book club- "Classy-Gals", various board activities, and 4 Rapid City grandchildren keep Nancy pretty busy. 

Gretchen Keefe-Palmer
Vice President

Biography

Gretchen has lived in Rapid City since 1989. After growing up in Bridgewater, SD she attended college at Buena Vista College in Storm Lake, IA and graduated with a degree in Finance and Banking. She moved to Rapid City to start a career in real estate which she still loves doing and is employed at Re/Max. In September 2006, she married her wonderful husband, Steve

James Speirs
Treasurer

Biography

James is a life-long resident of South Dakota with 27 years in Rapid City and is currently the VP for Membership of Black Hills Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America. James is a graduate of SDSU College of Pharmacy, MBA from USD and is a USAF Vietnam Veteran.

Sandra McNeely
RCPL Board Liaison

Biography

Sandra is the owner of consulting firm, the Abbey Group, Ltd. offering services in management, resource development, strategic planning, board development. She is also a member of:  Rapid City Public Library Board of Trustees (Vice President), Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Black Hills Board of Directors (President): volunteer for the Custer County Courthouse Museum and sons’ school.

Eric Abrahamson
Member

Biography

Eric John Abrahamson is an institutional and economic historian who has researched and written about for-profit and non-profit organizations and communities in the United States and Canada in industries and social sectors including telecommunications, banking, construction, food processing, and legal education. He has also worked on the development of museums for communities, tribes, and business organizations.

Abrahamson is president of Vantage Point Historical Services, Inc. He is immediate past chairman of the South Dakota State Library Board and past president of the Rapid City Public Library Foundation. He served on the Rapid City Board of Education from 2005-2008. He is the vice chairman of the Black Hills Area Community Foundation. He was the Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor in South Dakota in 2006.

Abrahamson received his Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University in 2003. His dissertation focused on the regulation of wireless communications and the development of cellular telephony. He is the author of a number of book-length works including Persistence and Perspective: Franklin Templeton Investments, the First Sixty Years (Franklin Templeton Investments, 2007) and Anytime, Anywhere: Entrepreneurship and the Creation of a Wireless World (Cambridge University Press, 2002) co-written with Dr. Louis Galambos.

Currently, Abrahamson is working on a book entitled The New Pioneers: Rural America, the Internet and the Next Chapter in the American Dream which explores the lives and livelihoods of digital pioneers on the northern Great Plains.

Greta Chapman
Director - Rapid City Public Library

Biography