DONNA Hunt

GRATEFUL FOR LIFE’S BLESSINGS

By Tanya Manus

As Donna Hunt looks forward to celebrating her 86th Christmas, she says many of the best gifts in her life are people — her family, friends, former students, plus some celebrities and politicians she’s felt fortunate to meet.

Helping others and developing cherished friendships are two of her lifelong passions.

“I have been so lucky to have super people in my life,” Donna said. “Much has been given to me. I hope I have given enough back.”

A lifelong South Dakotan, Donna was born and spent her early childhood in Wagner.

Her father, Neil Hansen, ran the Fairmont Dairy store and her mother, Olive, was a homemaker. Donna’s earliest memories are of her hometown and World War II, which began when she was five years old. Donna recalls her family enduring blackouts that became more frequent after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

“The sirens would ring and everybody was to turn off all the lights. You couldn’t even have a candle on. You closed the draperies and waited for the siren to come on so you could turn the lights on,” Donna recalls. “The fear was that Japan or Germany could pick out the towns and bomb us.”

“My biggest scare was the bombing of Pearl Harbor,” she said. “We had the old round radio and we were all sitting around it and listening to President Roosevelt saying Pearl Harbor had been bombed and it was just devastating.”

Her father was unable to enlist because of health reasons. “Many of the men were gone but my dad was not. He heard a lot of comments about that and wished he had could have gone,” Donna said.

The family moved to Rapid City in 1944, eventually making their home in Rapid Canyon. Donna and her older brothers, Deane and “Monk,” attended Cleghorn School.

“Dad was the president of the PTA and my mom was my Girl Scout troop leader, and that was my first taste of doing for others. I’m a real big believer in doing for others,” Donna said.

When Donna was 10, her beloved sister Sharon was born. Her mother was busy with the baby so Donna’s father introduced his daughter to one of her lifelong passions — horses.

“That’s when my dad said, ‘You need to get a horse.’ That might be one of the most important things in my life were my horses,” Donna said. “My father had gone to work for E.C. ‘Ping’ Murray. …

Ping was very active with South Dakota politics and had horses. Ping let me

The Volante. There, she met her first husband, Bob O’Donnell.