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Robert “Bob” Wilbur Bartling was a lifelong resident of Brookings, South Dakota, whose life was marked by dedication to athletics, business, education, and community service. Born on August 26, 1926, to Earl and Daisy Bartling, he graduated from Brookings High School in 1944, where he was Homecoming King and excelled in football, basketball, and track. His college education at South Dakota State University was interrupted by service in the U.S. Air Force during World War II. After the war, he earned a business degree from the University of Minnesota and completed training at the St. Louis College of Mortuary Science in 1952.

Bartling returned to Brookings and joined the family business, Bartling Furniture and Funeral Home, before later founding Bartling’s Shoes, South Dakota’s first Nike dealership. A devoted distance runner, he co-founded the Prairie Striders Running Club in 1970 and served as its first president and longtime treasurer. He ran the Jack 15 road race 38 times, held a U.S. Track & Field Masters record for the 30-kilometer distance, and remained active in athletics into his later years.

Bartling was deeply involved with South Dakota State University, where he established the Prairie Striders Running Library at the Hilton M. Briggs Library and began volunteering in the archives in 2015. He was honored by the South Dakota Library Association as “Friend of the Library” in 2019. Other recognitions included the Prairie Striders’ Friend of Running Award in 2007 and induction into the Brookings High School Sports Hall of Fame in 2009.

A longtime member of First Presbyterian Church in Brookings, Bartling served in various leadership roles and was named Outstanding Senior Presbyterian in 2016. He and his wife, Katherine Jean Taylor, were married in Brookings on June 11, 1949, and had two children, Jane and David. Bartling remained active into his 90s, including biking the Mickelson Trail at age 97. He passed away on February 24, 2024, at the age of 97.

Madge A. Kerlin was born February 9, 1901 in Iowa to Marvin P. and Anna R (Kisling) Kerlin. They moved to Chamberlain, South Dakota in 1903 and to Murdo, South Dakota in 1906. She attended South Dakota State College from 1920 to 1921.

Sometime between 1921 and 1923, Madge married World War I veteran Lloyd S. Bastian, who was born in Redfield, South Dakota on December 8, 1898. The 1930 United States Census shows Lloyd and Madge living in Beverly Hills, California with a one-year old son. Lloyd was listed as a dentist and Madge a homemaker. The 1940 US Census shows them living in Oxnard, California, with their two sons. Madge Kerlin Bastian died in Ventura, California on March 6, 1989. Lloyd Bastian died on September 20, 1989.

Lt. Ward B. Bates was born on February 17, 1895, in Yankton, South Dakota. His father, Charles Homer Bates, served as a U.S. Deputy Surveyor and conducted boundary surveys between South Dakota and North Dakota from 1891 to 1892. Bates attended the State University of Iowa in Iowa City.

He enlisted in the Army National Guard on December 1, 1912, and was honorably discharged on December 1, 1915. With the onset of World War I, Bates re-enlisted and was commissioned as a second lieutenant of field artillery on August 15, 1917. He served in the American Expeditionary Force (A.E.F.) in Europe and traveled across the United States with other newly commissioned officers during his training and assignments. He was honorably discharged on August 1, 1919.

Following the war, Bates moved to California, where he met and married Eunice Morey Wolcott. They had one daughter, Nancy Farley. Ward B. Bates died on October 21, 1946.

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Michigan University coach and wrestler

Artist

Historian and professor

SDSU Wrestler

SDSU Wrestler

SDSU Wrestler

SDSU Wrestler

Michigan State University Wrestler

Film critic, journalist, writer and political activist

Indiana State University Wrestler

SDSU Wrestler

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SDSU Wrestler

Professor Donald Berg earned a B.A. in History from North Dakota State University in 1964 and an M.A. in History in 1966. He completed a second M.A. at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1971 and received his Ph.D. in Geography from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1976.

Berg served in the U.S. Army from 1966 to 1969, including service in the Vietnam War from 1967 to 1968. During the summers of 1970, 1971, and 1972, he was employed as a seasonal ranger naturalist at Sequoia National Park in California.

He joined South Dakota State University as a professor of geography and history in 1990 and retired in May 2011. He also held earlier appointments at SDSU from 1983 to 1986. Berg taught courses primarily in physical geography, world regional geography, and environmental disasters and hazards, as well as seminars in regional geography, transportation, energy, and illegal drugs. His teaching also included courses in the history of the American West and American Indian history and culture. For more than fifteen years, he provided orientation sessions for students participating in the International Partnership for Service-Learning program.

Berg served as secretary treasurer of the Great Plains Rocky Mountain Division of the Association of American Geographers from 1994 to 2008 and was faculty sponsor for the Delta Zeta Chapter of Gamma Theta Upsilon beginning in 1994. He was the first instructor at South Dakota State University to offer live, real time interactive television courses on the Brookings campus and received two Governor’s Grants in 2000 and 2002 for the application of computer technology to online instruction in physical geography.

His research, professional presentations, and publications addressed topics including Native American casinos, the historical geography of railroads, federal defense and water development programs, and related book reviews and encyclopedia contributions. His later work focused on the historical geography of the Dust Bowl era in the northern Great Plains and the development and significance of the American Indian Reservation system in South Dakota.

SDSU Wrestler

Sherwood O. Berg was born and raised near Hendrum, Minnesota, where he actively participated in 4-H and took on responsibilities managing the family farm after the death of his father. He began his post-secondary education at the University of Minnesota's School of Agriculture before transferring to South Dakota State College (SDSC) in 1940, drawn by the strength of its agricultural program. His education was interrupted by military service in World War II, during which he served in the U.S. Army as a field infantryman and later as a Military Government Food and Agricultural Officer.

Following the war, Berg completed his B.S. degree at SDSC in 1947, earned an M.S. from Cornell University in 1948, and received his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1951. He served internationally as Agricultural Attaché to Yugoslavia, Norway, and Denmark (1951–1957) before returning to academia as Professor and Head of Agricultural Economics at the University of Minnesota. In 1963, he was appointed Dean of the Institute of Agriculture at the same institution and served as chair of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s National Advisory Commission on Food and Fiber.

From 1973 to 1975, Berg directed The Indonesia Project of the Midwest Universities Consortium and later returned to SDSU as its President on August 1, 1975, becoming the first alumnus to hold the role. His presidency was marked by institutional growth, international partnerships in Syria, Botswana, Senegal, and Mauritania, and increasing numbers of international students. He also facilitated the creation of SDSU’s first endowed faculty position—the Ethel Austin Martin-Edward Moss Martin Chair in Human Nutrition. He retired in 1984 as President Emeritus.

Berg married Elizabeth Ann Hall in 1952. They had two children.

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Lawyer, Legislator

Cartoonist

Cornell University Wrestler

Willibald C. Bianchi was born on March 12, 1915, in New Ulm, Minnesota, to Joseph and Carrie Bianchi.

He enrolled at South Dakota State College in 1937 and joined the R.O.T.C. program. Upon graduating in 1940, he was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Army and entered Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia, later earning promotion to First Lieutenant.

In April 1941, Bianchi was assigned to the 45th Infantry Regiment of the Philippine Scouts to assist in training Filipino soldiers. He remained in the Philippines after the U.S. entered World War II and was wounded during the Battle of Bataan on February 3, 1942. Despite multiple injuries, he continued fighting until he was incapacitated by an explosion. For his actions, General Douglas MacArthur awarded him the Medal of Honor, making Bianchi the third recipient of the medal during the war.

Promoted to Captain, Bianchi was captured on April 9, 1942, during the fall of Bataan. He endured the Bataan Death March and worked to aid fellow prisoners in the camps. After over two years in captivity, he died on January 9, 1945, when an unmarked prison ship was bombed by American forces.

Bianchi’s remains were never recovered. He is commemorated on the Wall of the Missing at the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial in the Philippines, with a grave marker at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, Hawaii.

In 1998, South Dakota State University honored Captain Bianchi with a memorial plaque in the Student Union, a commemorative ceremony, and the establishment of a scholarship in his name.

The George Biggar Papers document the career of a South Dakota-born broadcaster whose work in agricultural communication and radio production spanned from the 1920s through the 1960s. The collection likely includes materials related to Biggar’s early education and student publications at South Dakota State University, his professional correspondence and scripts from WLS in Chicago and WLW in Cincinnati, and documentation of his contributions to rural broadcasting and wartime agricultural reporting. His involvement in creating the National Barn Dance program and his oversight of farm and entertainment programming illustrate his role in shaping early American radio.

George Biggar played a significant role in the development of rural and agricultural radio in the United States. His work bridged the fields of agriculture, mass communication, and entertainment during a formative period for radio broadcasting. His participation in international agricultural tours during World War II reflects the connection between media and agricultural policy. Biggar’s career demonstrates the influence of South Dakota State University alumni in national broadcasting history and agricultural outreach.

Joye Ann Billow was born July 28, 1943, in Middletown, Pennsylvania, to Mary Dorothea (Pierce) and Schuyler Elsworth Billow. She graduated from Middletown High School in 1961 and earned a Bachelor of Science degree in pharmacy in 1967. She went on to complete a PhD in medicinal chemistry at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Billow joined the faculty of the South Dakota State University College of Pharmacy in 1972, where she served for 30 years until her retirement in 2002. She was a professor of pharmaceutical sciences and a licensed pharmacist throughout her career.

Dr. Billow was faculty advisor to the Chi Chapter of the Kappa Epsilon Fraternity for women pharmacy students for 29 years. During her tenure she received the Kappa Epsilon Outstanding Advisor Award (1991), the Unicorn Award (1991), and the Career Achievement Award (2003). Under her guidance, the Chi Chapter was recognized as the Outstanding Collegian KE Chapter for 2002–2003.

In 2002 Billow was honored with the SDSU Woman of Distinction Award in recognition of her service as a pharmacy faculty member and her involvement in campus and community organizations. Her contributions included coordinating the Bush Project, serving as chair and vice-chair of the Academic Senate, preparing the 1990 self-study for university accreditation, and helping to establish the Brookings Women’s Center, the Brookings Domestic Abuse Shelter, and Brookings Hospice.

After retiring, Billow pursued her interest in art, producing work that was featured in local exhibitions. She also served on the board of the Brookings Arts Council. Joye Ann Billow passed away on December 6, 2013, at the age of 70.

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Elvin C. Bjorklund (1908–1990) served as Deputy State Conservationist with the U.S. Soil Conservation Service. His career focused on soil and water conservation, including work on the Conservation Needs Inventory, flood prevention, and watershed protection. He played a key role in advancing conservation practices in South Dakota and contributed to regional and national efforts through administrative leadership and technical expertise.