HORACE LANGFORD JR. / PVTChannels 30/62 News Director Daniel Keenan dons an explosively vivid shirt and hat for the weekend Pahrump Valley Chamber of Commerce boat race at Terrible?s Lakeside. Behind the camera is Channel 30/62 General Manager Rick Manning. Advertisement

Channels 30 and 62 General Manager Rick Manning, has named Daniel J. Keenan as the news director for the stations.

Keenan brings a wide range of communications experience from on-camera work to executive-level management in television, radio, film and theater. He is also accomplished in public relations and marketing.

He graduated from John Carroll University with a degree in communications. Later, he did graduate work at the University of South Carolina.

A former enlisted Army infantry soldier, Keenan received a commission in the signal corps. After holding troop command positions in Germany and Vietnam, his first military media assignment was as an armed forces radio and television station manager in Japan.

Following that, he worked at the Pentagon as a radio, television and motion picture writer/producer/director.

Later, Keenan helped to bring satellite education to Army Reserve Centers nationwide. He ended his 20-year career as a public affairs officer and the command briefer at the Army's largest stateside command, retiring as a lieutenant colonel.

In the private sector, Keenan was a National Endowment for the Arts media intern and a news editor for American Legion Magazine.

Then, as the first executive producer for world-renowned Recorded Books Inc., Keenan produced and directed the first two dozen recordings, four of which he narrated.

Also an actor, Keenan did on- and off-camera work in Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Md., Dayton, Ohio, and Salt Lake City, Utah.

He has appeared in major roles in nearly 30 theater productions.

Keenan's last job before retiring was a development director at a New York military academy near West Point. There, he spearheaded a strategic development plan, raising $2 million dollars in donations in just two years.

Keenan came to Pahrump last year, planning a life of leisure. In early May, he met Channel 30/62 General Manager Rick Manning at the Pahrump Business Expo.

The two found much in common and Rick asked Keenan to be his news director. That ended Keenan's retirement plans -- at least for awhile.