Congratulations to our Citizen of the Year

In this week’s issue of the Custer County Chronicle you will find our annual Citizen of the Year story, with the ubiquitous Marge McColley winning this year’s honors.
We’ve been giving out our annual Citizen of the Year award now for well over a decade, and each and every year we have to narrow down our choice from a pool of very worthy candidates. The reason for that, of course, is Custer County is full of amazing people who have servant’s hearts, and go out of their way to help their neighbors. It’s what makes Custer County such a great place to live.
It’s usually early fall when we start seriously thinking about who should be named our Citizen of the Year. We were already tossing around names when the annual Custer Area Chamber of Commerce banquet was held back in October. It was at that banquet that McColley won the chamber’s inaugural “Heart of Custer” award. When we heard the list of accomplishments McColley has had in her lifetime, coupled with her years and years of volunteer service to the county, the choice was a no-brainer. We won’t repeat all those accolades here, but check out the story on the front page. At 98 years young, McColley has done so much for the county, both young and old. We should all aspire to serve our community the way she has.
We knew we had made the right choice when we began to tell people who needed to know. Some version of the phrase “what a great choice!” was said to us several times over. Truthfully, there are a number of people in our county who would have received the same reaction, but people were especially enthusiastic when they heard it was McColley.
So what do we mean when we talk about “people who needed to know” we had named McColley our citizen of the year? Well, to write the story, we need people who know the citizen to help us with the story. They tell us about all the things that person has accomplished, what makes them great, and they even provide plenty of photos for us. A big thank you to Kim Canete at The Storehouse for providing the photos we used both in the story and on the ad on page 6A.
As always, it is our hope we can host a reception for our Citizen of the Year just as soon as we can find a time and day that works for Marge that coincides with one of our local establishments that is capable of hosting such an event. We will keep you posted on the when and where of the reception, if it is possible to get one put together.
Last year we named Rex Jorgensen our Citizen of the Year, and it was a little bit of a lifetime achivement award. The same could be said about Marge; she’s most deserving of the award. She really didn’t slow down her volunteering until recently. Truly amazing.
Congratulations, Marge, and thank you for all you have done, and continue to do, for Custer County. You are a shining example of a life of service and the type of people that can make a commuity a truly special place. It is our pleasure to name you our Citizen of the Year for 2025. Just the latest in a long list of well-deserved awards.