BY Albert N. Williams AMERICAN RESORT SERIES NO. 4 Southern Methodist University Press 1952 COPYRIGHT, 1952, BY SOUTHERN METHODIST UNIVERSITY PRESS PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA BY AMERICAN BOOK—STRATFORD PRESS, INC., NEW YORK AMERICAN RESORT SERIES For Chris The research on early Black Hills and Badlands history was ably assisted by Miss June Carothers, whose services were provided the author through a generous grant-in-aid by the University of Denver’s Bureau of Humanities and Social

I have had an opportunity to enjoy one of the most readable accounts of the Black Hills I have ever come across. It is written to acquaint traveling America with an area which was long off the beaten path of tourists, and which has only during the past quarter century been recognized as a place where people who wish to “Know America First” may profitably spend some time. Mr. Williams has outlined the historical reason why this small wonderland was so long outside the consciousness of America, an

The thing to remember is that the Black Hills are not hills at all. They are mountains, the highest mountains east of the Rockies, with Harney Peak rising to a height of 7,242 feet above sea level. Inasmuch as the prairie floor averages, at the four entrances to the Hills, only 3,200 feet in elevation, these are mountains of considerable stature. The title “hills” was by no means given the area by early white settlers. Indeed, if that majestic domain had not already been named the Black Hills by

The next period of the earth’s age—the Ordovician period, which extended from 430,000,000 to 350,000,000 years ago—has left its mark just as visibly upon the Black Hills. It was during this period that the many species of invertebrate marine life reached a zenith of development, and that a bed of sediment was laid down and later compressed to a pinkish limestone. The fact that this Ordovician bed is less than forty feet thick indicates that the land mass from which the muds and sands were drawn

The Wind Cave lies ten miles north of Hot Springs on U.S. 85A. The cavern is the focal point of interest in its own National Park, which takes in forty square miles. Nearly half of this park is enclosed with a high fence, behind which one of the last great bison herds roams contentedly. Protected antelope, elk, and deer also enjoy this game preserve. The cavern was discovered, according to legend, by a cowboy who heard a continued low whistling noise in the weeds and, investigating, found air ru

Custer State Park is located almost in the center of the Black Hills. Containing nearly one hundred and fifty thousand acres, it is one of the largest state parks in America. It was originally set aside as a state game refuge, and it was not until the advent of summer touring as a national pastime that the state of South Dakota purchased additional private lands which contained scenic wonders, incorporating all of them into the one large area. Today the park is the center of all tourist activity

Harney Peak stands like a sentinel in Custer Park. The highest point in the Black Hills, it rises to an altitude of 7,242 feet, 4,000 feet above the prairie floor outside the Hills. Higher by 900 feet than Mount Washington in New Hampshire, it is the highest mountain east of the Rockies. High as it is, Harney Peak is by no means the typical mountain which tourists come to expect after a trip through Colorado, for example, or western Wyoming. It is older by ages than the precipitous and craggy Ro

The Needles Highway, a fourteen-mile stretch of road, branches off U.S. 16 about five miles west of the Game Lodge. At the time of its construction in 1920-21 it was regarded as an engineering marvel, although later exploits of American highway builders, such as the road to the top of fourteen-thousand-foot Mount Evans in Colorado, have since far overshadowed this accomplishment. The road winds and curves in an interminable pattern, finding its way, by trial and error it seems, among the great g

Not all of the scenery in the Black Hills was created by Nature. Sylvan Lake, in many respects the most beautiful corner of the region, was made entirely by hand. It was near the turn of the century when two hunters, Dr. Jennings of Hot Springs and Joseph Spencer of Chicago, got the intriguing idea of having an additional tourist attraction in the vicinity of Harney Peak—a lake. Along the Needles Highway Harney Peak older by ages than the Rockies Some lakes are difficult to construct, while some

From Sylvan Lake around back of the north side of Harney Peak it is a drive of but a few miles to the second man-made wonder of the Hills—the Mount Rushmore Memorial. Perhaps no one thing has done so much to make the Black Hills known throughout the world as this incredible undertaking—the carving in the natural granite face of a mountain of the faces of our four most revered presidents: Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt. “Teddy” is included for his lasting service to the pe

It is not entirely accurate to refer to the Mount Rushmore Memorial as the other man-made wonder in the Hills. At the moment it is the only such marvel outside of Sylvan Lake; but in twenty-five or thirty years it will have to share that honor with the Crazy Horse Memorial, a statue carved on top of Thunderhead Mountain, between Harney Peak and the town of Custer. This gigantic carving, which will be an entire figure and not a mere bas-relief, will be an equestrian statue of the great Sioux chie

In this same general region lies another prominent Black Hills landmark which every tourist should take time to visit—Mount Coolidge. With a height of 6,400 feet, this peak is by no means an outstanding mountain, being ranked by a good half dozen higher within the Hills. But from its summit, which can be reached by an auto road leading off U.S. 85A a few miles to the north of Wind Cave Park, an amazing vista can be seen. To the east, on a clear day, the White River Badlands loom as a great valle

Since the Black Hills are underbedded so widely by limestone, it is not surprising to find in them not one but several memorable caverns. There are, as a matter of fact, a dozen or more well-known large caves; but outside of Wind Cave, only Jewel Cave has been opened and fully prepared for public visit. The expense of exploring, lighting, and carving trails in the others has kept them off the market, so to speak, for in a region so packed with scenic delights two great caverns are about as much

The foregoing are only a very few of the scenic wonders of the Black Hills. Detailed information on the various other scenic features is easily to be had at any of the hotels and tourist courts in the Hills, and brochures covering practically every landmark are available gratis, thanks to the enthusiasm of the local chambers of commerce, the Black Hills and Badlands Association, and the state of South Dakota. The area is crisscrossed with good roads, and no matter which route one takes to his ev

Gold, they say, is where you find it. In California in 1848—in Montana in 1852—in Colorado in 1858—in Arizona, in Nevada: when they finally found it in the Black Hills in 1874, the Gold Rush West had nearly all been settled and the bonanza days were forever gone, for all the likely places had been searched. The question posed is an obvious one. With sourdoughs plowing and digging up the bed of every stream and rivulet in the West from 1849 on, how did it come about that the Black Hills, lying a

Sam left where he was working one pretty morn in May, a-heading for the Black Hills with his cattle and his pay. Sold out in Custer City and then got on a spree, A harder set of cowboys you seldom ever see. —“ Legend of Sam Bass ” It has become the literary custom to recall our bonanza frontier less as an economic phenomenon than as a backdrop for bloodshed, mayhem, and assorted turns of vigor and violence. Early California, for example, is today known less as the scene of the accomplishments of

Any visit to the Black Hills must also be the occasion of a tour, at least for a few hours, of the famous South Dakota Badlands. This fantastic National Monument is not a part of the Hills, either geographically or historically, but because the two regions lie so close together—a scant fifty miles apart—they are expediently linked as two great natural wonders in the same region. The term “badlands” has a loose scientific acceptance, meaning any region where a specific type of heavy erosion has t

Allsman, Paul T. Reconnaissance of Gold Mining Districts in the Black Hills, South Dakota. U.S. Bureau of Mines, No. 427. Washington, D. C.: U.S. Dept. of Interior, 1940. Baldwin, G. P. , editor. The Black Hills Illustrated. Philadelphia: Baldwin Syndicate, 1904. Carpenter, F. R. The Mineral Resources of the Black Hills. South Dakota School of Mines Preliminary Report, No. 1. Rapid City: South Dakota School of Mines, 1888. Casey, Robert J. The Black Hills. New York: Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1949. Dick