![]() ![]() South Dakota’s congressional delegation, and Rapid City’s business and civic leaders, were successful in winning Rapid City Army Air Base where the airport had taken form five years earlier. But Box Elder’s transformation happened in 1942, during World War II. Highway 14, though still a dirt road, was moving cars through town toward Mount Rushmore. Then in 1937, Rapid City built a modernized airport at Box Elder, and at the same time U.S. It was the spot where passengers sometimes stood, stretched their legs, and collected parcels minutes before detraining at Rapid City, just west. How Box Elder got to this point is a story unlike any other in South Dakota. “I care about its growth, and how it grows.” “I’m passionate about Box Elder,” he says. ![]() ![]() He’s changing Box Elder’s appearance with both housing and commercial developments. He graduated from high school in Box Elder in 2000, served a military stint, then started Boom Construction of Rapid City in 2004. Box Elder, Hrabe finds, is an ideal setting for building a workforce that mixes retired “crusty master sergeants” and “shiny penny” new engineers from nearby South Dakota School of Mines and Technology in Rapid City.Īnd there’s Daene Boomsma. Now, as Ellsworth Air Force Base awaits what will likely be its latest bomber mission - the B-21 - a new breed of builders is also contributing to the city’s rapid growth.Ĭonsider Rob Hrabe, co-founder and CEO of VRC Metals Systems, the high-tech company pioneering cold spray, a process that uses nitrogen or helium to accelerate metal particles in repairing everything from jet components to golf clubs. Ellsworth Air Force Base's hangars are visible in the distance.īox Elder has been called the South Dakota town that Army and Air Force bombers built. A view from Radar Hill shows Box Elder's expansive landscape. ![]()
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