You’ve probably noticed Jaci Conrad Pearson’s byline on stories over the last few weeks. She’s been on the job since the beginning of June — but she’s no newcomer to the Star-Herald or to Scottsbluff. Joan von Kampen While she’s been writing news stories since her return, starting next week she’ll be wearing a different hat as an advertising representative.
Jaci graduated from Scottsbluff High School “when Madonna was the bomb, Bon Jovi was blaring from our Trans-Am, Camaro and other late-model beauties’ speakers ...
and my hair was a mile high,” she said. After graduating from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with a major in advertising and minors in marketing, English and psychology, she worked in financial marketing in Denver for five years. Then she returned here “to spend time with my parents (who never thought they were going to get rid of me, because I was kinda like a homing pigeon).
” Former Star-Herald Publisher Steve Hungerford soon hired her as marketing director. “The business acumen he instilled in me, I still follow and value, to this day,” she said. “No excuses, just get the job done and be ready to admit your mistakes, if you make them.
” The last 24 years she’s lived outside Deadwood, South Dakota, working as a journalist and advertising sales representative at the Black Hills Pioneer, ISS/detention supervisor at Lead-Deadwood High/Middle School and oral history interviewer for the city of Deadwood Historic Preservation Depa.