Sweetman named St. Patrick’s Day Parade grand marshal

Business leader and Irishman Dick Sweetman will lead this year’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade in downtown Sioux Falls.

Sweetman, 86, is the first of 42 grand marshals to be an actual citizen of Ireland. The former head of Sweetman Construction is part of a family with a long history of business and community involvement.

In addition to leading the construction company from 1959 to 1996, he was head of Terin Construction Co. from 1996 to 2009, founder of the Ellis and Eastern Railroad and part of the leadership of The Ramkota Companies and Kelly Inns.

He continues to serve as president of Spencer Quarries near Spencer.

Later this year, the state’s first planetarium will open at the Washington Pavilion thanks to a lead gift from Dick and Kathy Sweetman.

The parade will be March 18.

 “It seems that everyone can claim at least a little Irish blood in their veins, which is ample excuse to hoist a pint or two,” Sweetman said in a statement. “It is also a joyful break in the middle of the dreary winter, and we thank the good saint for it.”

The Sweetman heritage is in County Wexford along the southeast coast of Ireland.  The ancestral home is Clohamon, and the Sweetman family traces its lineage back 10 generations to the early 1700s.

In the latter part of the 1800s, “an ambitious group of Irish Catholics” led by a member of the Sweetman family in Dublin established “The Sweetman Irish Colony” in Minnesota about 85 miles east of Sioux Falls. Sweetman’s grandfather was sent from Ireland to manage the project and decided to stay in Minnesota.

Sweetman grew up in Sioux Falls, one of five children. His father, R.S., purchased the construction company where he had worked for 22 years in 1952 and named it Sweetman Construction.

Sweetman and his wife, Kathy, have three children and six grandchildren.

A 1958 graduate of the University of Notre Dame, Sweetman has maintained close ties with the university through its Ireland council. He became an Irish citizen in 2001 under a program that granted dual citizenship to people whose grandparents were born in Ireland. His family has maintained close ties with relatives in in Ireland.

“On our first trip to the fabled isle, my first impression upon leaving the airport terminal was a sense of returning home,” Sweetman said.

The St. Patrick’s Day Extravaganza Committee plans the parade with support from the Greater Sioux Falls Chamber of Commerce. The parade was organized informally in 1980 by the late Sylvia Henkin. She stepped down in 2013 after serving as parade grand marshal for the second time. Her successor is Shawn Cleary, president of Tiger Corp.

The parade usually has about 100 entries and is called the people’s parade because anyone can participate as long as they are registered or part of a registered group and wearing an official St. Patrick’s Day Parade button costing $3.

Registration, which closes March 12, is available at siouxfallsevents.com. Placement in the parade is on a first come, first served basis and is at the discretion of parade officials. Each entry must have some kind of Irish theme. A link also includes detailed information on the parade, including rules for participation.

Buttons are available in advance at the Chamber of Commerce office, 200 N. Phillips Ave., and numerous businesses throughout the community. They also can be purchased the day of the parade at the start of the route.

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