Dave Kiffer is a fourth generation Ketchikan resident on both sides of his family.
His mother's grandparents came to the Ketchikan area to work in the mining industry in 1896 and his father's family came to Ketchikan in
1919 and worked in the fishing and timber industries.
Mayor Kiffer graduated from Ketchikan High School in 1977 and attended college in Southern California. In 1988, he graduated cum laude from Northeastern University in Boston with a bachelor of arts degree in journalism and in 1999 received a master's degree in creative writing from Lancaster University in England after spending a year studying abroad in Ireland.
He spent twenty years in the journalism industry working for newspapers and radio stations in Alaska, Massachusetts and Wyoming.
Mayor Kiffer is the executive director of Historic Ketchikan, Inc, a local non-profit that promotes economic development through historic preservation and heritage tourism.
He also currently teaches music history at University of Alaska-Southeast, Ketchikan Campus and gives private lessons on saxophone, flute, clarinet and other woodwinds. He continues to have a very active freelance writing career. Many of his humor columns and local historical stories can be viewed on the SITNEWS.US website.
His wife, Charlotte Glover, is the programming and children's services librarian for the Ketchikan Public Library. Their son Liam, is 8 years old and is on track to win the 5K race in the 2020 Olympics. |
