Longtime Hermosa area rancher Don Knapp and South Dakota State University Cooperative Extension Service educator Bill Keck received the top awards Thursday night at the annual Ag Appreciation Banquet sponsored by the Rapid City Area Chamber of Commerce.

Keck, Extension educator for horticulture based in Rapid City, received the Aggie of the Year award. Knapp received the Ag Producer of the Year award.

Knapp, 78, grew up in New Underwood and Rapid City and served in the U.S. Navy in the Korean War.

He worked for many years at Northwestern Bell Telephone Co., and during that time bought and operated a small ranch near Hermosa.

Retiring from the phone company at 51, he bought part of the 100-year-old Western Cattle Co. Ranch east of Hermosa, which he still operates.

He began a crop-rotation system that became a show program for South Dakota's congressional delegation when they brought visiting dignitaries, according to a news release.

He has been involved in community organizations including Custer County Fair Board. He helped organize the Hermosa Water Users Association and helped crews lay pipe to bring water to many Hermosa area ranches.

In the 1980s, he served on a temporary board that worked through the reorganization of the Production Credit Association and the Federal Land Bank into the Farm Credit Association.

He has served on the board of directors for Black Hills Electric Cooperative since 1987.

He and his wife, Maxine, have three children.

Keck, 60, a native of Pennsylvania, graduated from Pennsylvania State University in 1969 with a degree in animal husbandry. After serving in the Navy, he earned a master's degree in beef cattle nutrition at Penn State in 1974.

Keck began his Extension career in Pennsylvania and moved in 1977 to Colorado Springs, Colo., where he served as the 4-H livestock agent.

He moved to Rapid City in 1991, where he has served as the ag/horticulture educator for Pennington County.

Since 1992, Keck has served as superintendent of the futurity beef carcass show at the Western Junior Livestock Show. Keck also is coordinator of the Western National 4-H Horse Classic in Denver. He is chairman of the Hippology Contest at the South Dakota State Horse Show.

Keck also has been involved with the Black Hills Stock Show Youth Day, directs the Master Gardener program in Rapid City and was instrumental in establishing the Character Counts coalition.

He is active in the Urban Forestry Board, Urban Wildlife Committee, Central States Fair, South Dakota State Fair, South Dakota Stockgrowers Association, Cosmopolitan Club, Canyon Lake United Methodist Church and the Rapid City Area Chamber of Commerce Ag and Natural Resources Committee.

He and wife, Jeanette, have three children.

More than 600 people were registered to attend the ag banquet.