After a lifetime of legal practice and years of service to Pennington County, judges Craig Pfeifle and Jane Wipf Pfeifle have finally decided to hang up their robes. Now in their mid-sixties, the husband-and-wife duo will move on to tackle another area of life — retirement and grandparenthood. What they'll miss ranges from the people they work with to never-ending intellectual stimulation and the ability to truly make an impact.
"I think that everything that we do every day is impactful, and I try to do it in a positive way," Craig Pfeifle said. "I'm going to miss that, because that's just rewarding." Both were set on their career path early on.
Jane Wipf grew up in Wagner, a small South Dakota town where the only jobs for women appeared to be nurse, teacher or bank teller. She remembered going to her father's law office as a child, saying she really enjoyed what her father did. A third grade assignment asked her to write down what she wanted to do as a grown-up, so young Jane put down "lawyer" — and stayed on that path.
In the heat of Sioux Falls summers, middle-school-aged Craig Pfeifle mowed lawns. "I realized that of the lawns that I did, it was like doctor, doctor, business owner — which I knew I couldn't do — and lawyer, and I thought, you know, of the guys who don't mow their own lawns, I could probably be a lawyer," Pfeifle laughed. "In all seriousness, I liked the guy.
He did a lot of stuff in our community. He was a really interesting man, and easy to talk t.