RAPID CITY- Maria McCarthy Anderson, 47, of Rapid City, passed away peacefully Thursday, January 12 after a long battle with cancer. Maria's death came seven months and one day after the passing of her husband, Peter.

Maria was born October 5, 1969 and grew up in Rapid City. She graduated from Stevens High School in 1988 and later graduated from Holy Cross College in Worcester, Massachusetts with degrees in English and History.

In the years following Maria's graduation, she served in the Jesuit Volunteer Corps in Southern California and later as Regional Director of the Jesuit Volunteer Corps based in San Francisco. After Maria's volunteer service, she enrolled in Columbia University's School of Public Affairs for the 1993 class and was awarded a scholarship as a teaching assistant in economics during her second year. Upon graduation, Maria worked for a year at the Bronx Borough President's office.

While serving as a teaching assistant at Columbia, Maria met and fell in love with Peter Anderson, one of the students in her Microeconomics class. The two were married 21 years ago in Rapid City on June 29, 1996.

Following their marriage, Pete and Maria lived for a year in Jakarta, Indonesia before moving home to Rapid City, where the couple became owners of MAC Construction. In addition to building MAC's business and developing local properties, Maria also found time to serve as a board member for the Rapid City Library.

In addition to her achievements in Rapid City, Maria took every opportunity to feed her academic and spiritual interests.   Over the years, Maria participated in Dartmouth University's Business Owners program, took classes at Stanford University and participated in numerous book clubs. Since 2014, Maria also attended the Center for Action and Contemplation at the Living School in Santa Fe, New Mexico. These learning experiences were augmented by family trips to Europe and Latin America and trips with Peter to Italy and China.

Beyond all of the experiences listed, Maria's greatest legacy was as a wife and mother to four tremendous children; Isabel, Ben, Eli and Stella. In addition to her children, Maria is also survived by her parents, Steve and Liz McCarthy, her sister and brother-in-law, Chabella and Doug May and their children, Maribel and Sam.

Visitation will be from 5:00-7:00 pm on Thursday, January 19 at Blessed Sacrament Church with a Christian Wake Service at 6:00 p.m.

Christian Funeral Mass will be offered at 10:00 a.m., Friday, January 20, at Blessed Sacrament Church with Rev. Brian Lane presiding. Lunch will follow.

The family suggests memorials to the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance for Doctor Seth Pollack's discretionary fund.