Facts and Figures

Area, 77,047 sq mi (199,552 sq km). Pop. (2000) 754,844, an 8.5% increase since the 1990 census. Capital, Pierre. Largest city, Sioux Falls. Statehood, Nov. 2, 1889 (40th state), simultaneously with North Dakota. Highest pt., Harney Peak, 7,242 ft (2,209 m); lowest pt., Big Stone Lake, 962 ft (293 m). Nicknames, Rushmore State; Coyote State. Motto, Under God the People Rule. State bird, ring-necked pheasant. State flower, pasqueflower. State tree, Black Hills spruce. Abbr., S.Dak.; SD

Geography

South Dakota shows some of the earliest geologic history of the continent in the rock formations of the ancient Black Hills and in the Badlands. In the area between the White River and the south fork of the Cheyenne, the Badlands display in their deeply eroded clay gullies not only colorful, fantastic shapes, but also a wealth of easily accessible marine and land fossils (the Badlands National Monument preserves the area for its startling scenery and geologic interest). From east to west the state rises some 6,000 ft (1,829 m) to Harney Peak (7,242 ft/2,207 m) in the Black Hills, highest point in the United States E of the Rockies.

Through the center of the state the Missouri River cuts a wide valley southward; other principal rivers include the James and the Big Sioux to the east, and the Cheyenne, the Belle Fourche, the Moreau, the Grand River, and the White River to the west. The whole of South Dakota has a continental climate; summer brings a succession of hot, cloudless days, and in winter blizzards sweep across bare hillsides, filling the coulees with deep snow. The average annual rainfall is low, and declines from east to west across the state, and in years of drought summer winds blow away acres of top soil in "black blizzards."

Among the state's attractions are Badlands and Wind Cave national parks, Jewel Cave National Monument, and the famous gigantic carvings of the Mount Rushmore National Memorial (see National Parks and Monuments, table). Pierre is the capital; the largest cities are Sioux Falls and Rapid City.

Economy

Almost one third of the region west of the Missouri River, a semiarid, treeless plain, belongs to Native Americans, most of whom live on reservations such as Cheyenne River, Pine Ridge, Rosebud, and Standing Rock. Much of the remaining area is occupied by large ranches; there cattle and sheep ranching provide the major source of income, with soybean and wheat farming second in the production of revenue. In the more productive region east of the Missouri, livestock and livestock products are the primary sources of income. Corn, soybeans, oats, and wheat are South Dakota's chief cash crops; sunflowers, sorghum, flaxseed, and barley are also grown. Although there is a certain amount of diversified industry, including electronics manufacturing, in Sioux Falls and Rapid City, meatpacking and food processing are by far the major industries of the state.

Gold is South Dakota's most important mineral, and the town of Lead in the Black Hills is the country's leading gold-mining center. Tourism, focusing especially on Mt. Rushmore and other Black Hills sites, and gambling are also major sources of income.

Government and Higher Education

South Dakota is governed under its 1889 constitution. The legislature consists of 35 senators and 70 representatives, all elected for two-year terms. The governor is elected for four years. William Janklow, a Republican who had previously occupied the statehouse from 1979 to 1987, was elected governor in 1994 and reelected in 1998. He was succeeded by fellow Republican Mike Rounds, elected in 2002 and reelected four years later. The state sends one U.S. representative and two senators to the U.S. Congress and has three electoral votes.

Institutions of higher learning in South Dakota include Augustana College, at Sioux Falls; Northern State College, at Aberdeen; the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, at Rapid City; South Dakota State Univ., at Brookings; and the Univ. of South Dakota, at Vermillion.

History

At the time of European exploration, South Dakota was inhabited by Native Americans of the agricultural Arikara and the nomadic Sioux (Dakota). By the 1830s the Sioux had driven the Arikara from the area. Part of the region that is now South Dakota was explored in the mid-18th cent. by sons of the sieur de la Vérendrye. The United States acquired the region as part of the Louisiana Purchase, and it was partially explored by Lewis and Clark in their Missouri River expedition of 1804-6. Later explorers became well acquainted with the warlike Sioux, who continued to dominate the region from the period of the fur trade until to the middle of the 19th cent. Individual traders from the time of Pierre Dorion in the late 18th cent. made the region their home, and the posts founded by Pierre Chouteau and the American Fur Company were the first bases for settlement. (Fort Pierre was established in 1817.)

It was not until land speculators and farmers moved westward from Minnesota and Iowa in the 1850s that any significant settlements developed in South Dakota. Two land companies were established at Sioux Falls in 1856, and in 1859 Yankton, Bon Homme, and Vermillion were laid out. A treaty with the Sioux opened the land between the Big Sioux and the Missouri, and in 1861 Dakota Territory was established, embracing not only present-day North and South Dakota but also E Wyoming and E Montana. Yankton was the capital. Settlers were discouraged by droughts, conflicts with the Native Americans, and plagues of locusts; however, by the time the railroad pushed to Yankton in 1872, the region had received the first of the European immigrants who later came in great numbers, contributing significant German, Scandinavian, and Russian elements to the Dakotas.

Rumors of gold in the Black Hills, confirmed by a military expedition led by George A. Custer in 1874, excited national interest, and wealth seekers began to pour into the area. However, much of the Black Hills region had been granted (1868) to the Sioux by treaty, and when they refused to sell either mining rights or the reservation itself, warfare again broke out. The defeat (1876) of Custer and his men by Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, and Gall in the battle of the Little Bighorn (in what is now Montana) did not prevent the whites from gradually acquiring more and more Native American land, including the gold-lined Black Hills.

The near extinction of the buffalo herds, Sitting Bull's death (1890) at the hands of army-trained Native American police, and the subsequent massacre of Big Foot's band at Wounded Knee Creek were among the factors leading to the permanent end of Native American resistance in South Dakota. Tribal organization was weakened by the Dawes Act of 1887. Although the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 attempted to restore tribal ownership of repurchased lands, younger generations have moved to the cities in increasing numbers. During the 1870s the gold fever mounted; Deadwood had its day of gaudy glory, Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane created frontier legends, and the town of Lead began its long, productive history.

Although gold did not make the fortune of South Dakota, it laid the foundation by stimulating cattle ranching—herds of cattle were first brought to the grasslands of W South Dakota partly to supply food for the miners. Settlement in the east also increased and the period from 1878 to 1886, following the resumption of railroad building after the financial depression earlier in the decade, was the time of the great Dakota land boom, when the region's population increased threefold.

Agitation for statehood developed; in 1888 the Republican party adopted the statehood movement as a campaign issue, and in 1889 Congress passed an enabling act. The Dakotas were separated; South Dakota became a state with Pierre as capital. Disasters, however, rocked its security. The unusually severe winter of 1886-87 had destroyed huge herds of cattle in the west, ruining the great bonanza ranches and promoting among the ranchers the trend—dominant ever since—of having smaller herds with provisions for winter shelter and feeding. Cattle grazed on public land and were rounded up only for branding and shipment to market.

Recurrent droughts added to the difficulties of the farmers, who sought economic relief in the cooperative ventures of the Farmers' Alliance and political influence in the Populist party, which won a resounding victory in 1896. Initiative and referendum were adopted (1898; South Dakota was the first state to adopt them) and other progressive measures of the day were enacted. However, prosperity resumed, and with it South Dakota quickly returned to political conservatism and the Republican party.

The extension of railroads (particularly the Milwaukee, which was the only transcontinental line passing through South Dakota) encouraged further expansion of agriculture, but new droughts (especially that of 1910-11) brought a brief period of emigration. Many new farmsteads were abandoned, and a turn toward political radicalism developed. The Progressive party, led by Peter Norbeck (governor 1917-21) and operating as a branch of the Republican party, revived the attempts of Populist reform programs to regulate railroad rates and raise assessments of corporate property. The Progressives also entered into experiments in state ownership of business.

Prosperity-depression cycles again affected the state after the boom of World War I. The combination of droughts and the Great Depression brought widespread calamities in the late 1920s and early 30s, and the state's population declined by 50,000 between 1930 and 1940. Vigorous relief measures were instituted under the New Deal, and higher farm prices during World War II and the ensuing years brought a new era of hopefulness.

The 1950s began a period of Democratic strength in state politics. George McGovern was elected to the House of Representatives in 1956 and to the Senate in 1962, 1968, and 1974. In 1972 McGovern ran unsuccessfully for president. In 1973 a militant Native American group occupied a courthouse at Wounded Knee and the resulting gun battle with federal marshals heightened the long-time Native American resentment of the U.S. government over the issue of broken treaties.

In the postwar period the adoption of improved farming techniques resulted in a steady increase in agricultural and livestock production. This was accompanied, however, by the consolidation of small farms into large units and the displacement of many small farmers. Irrigation projects, extension of hydroelectric power, and protective measures against wind and water erosion have been implemented, avoiding the threat of new disasters. In 1981 a major New York bank relocated its credit-card operations to Sioux Falls, marking the beginning of the state's shift toward service, finance, and trade industries that, in turn, has resulted in significant economic growth. Some casino gambling was legalized in 1989 and tourism continues to be one of the state's top sources of income.

Facts and Figures

Area, 70,665 sq mi (183,022 sq km). Pop. (2000) 642,200, a 0.5% increase from 1990 pop. Capital, Bismarck. Largest city, Fargo. Statehood, Nov. 2, 1889 (39th state), simultaneously with South Dakota. Highest pt., White Butte, 3,506 ft (1,069 m); lowest pt., Red River, 750 ft (229 m). Nicknames, Sioux State; Flickertail State. Motto, Liberty and Union, Now and Forever, One and Inseparable. State bird, Western meadowlark. State flower, wild prairie rose. State tree, American elm. Abbr., N.Dak.; ND

Geography

Situated in the geographical center of North America, North Dakota is subject to the extremes of a continental climate. Semiarid conditions prevail in the western half of the state, but in the east an average annual rainfall of 22 in. (55 cm), much of it falling in the crop-growing spring and summer months, enables the rich soil to yield abundantly. North Dakota is one of the most rural states in the nation; the cities and towns supply the needs of neighboring farms, and industry is largely devoted to the processing of agricultural products.

The eastern half of the state is in the central lowlands, a belt of black earth covered in spring by the soft green of sprouting grain and later by the bronze of flowering wheat or the blue of flax. Along the banks of the Red River lies a wedge of land, c.40 mi (60 km) wide at the Canadian border and tapering to 10 mi (16 km) in the south, that is the floor of the former glacial Lake Agassiz. Treeless, except along the rivers, and without surface rocks, this flat land was transformed into the bonanza wheat fields of the 1870s and 80s, with farms ranging in size from 3,000 to 65,000 acres (1,200-26,000 hectares). Today the average farm in the Red River valley is about 450 acres (180 hectares); the state average is about 1,300 acres (525 hectares). Its major crop, wheat, is varied with such crops as flax and seed potatoes.

To the west of the valley a series of escarpments rises some 300 ft (91 m) to meet the drift prairies, where rolling hills, scattered lakes, and occasional moraines form a pleasant and fertile countryside. The productivity of the soil makes North Dakota a leader in wheat (ranking second in the nation), barley, sugar beets, oats, soybeans, and sunflowers. In income earned, however, cattle and cattle products exceed all the crops except wheat.

In the western part of the state a combination of unfavorable topography and scant rainfall precludes intensive cultivation except in the river valleys. An area some 50 mi (80 km) E of the Missouri River is a farm and grazing belt, separated from the drift prairies by the Missouri escarpment. Westward from the Missouri rolls an irregular plateau, covered with short prairie grasses and cut by deep gullies. Where wind and rain have eroded the hillsides there are unusual formations of sand and clay, glowing in yellows, reds, browns, and grays. Along the Little Missouri this section is called the Badlands, so named because the region (once described as "hell with the fires out") was difficult to traverse in early days. Situated there, where from 1883 to 1886 the young Theodore Roosevelt spent part of each year ranching, are the three units of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Bismarck, on the eastern bank of the Missouri River, is the capital and Fargo is the largest city.

Economy

On the plateau cattle graze, finding shelter in the many ravines, and large ranges are an economic necessity. In the northwestern area of the state oil was discovered in 1951, and petroleum is now North Dakota's leading mineral product, ahead of sand and gravel, lime, and salt. There are also natural-gas fields. Underlying the western counties are lignite reserves; close to the lignite beds are deposits of clay of such varied types that they serve as both construction and pottery materials.

Despite mineral production and some manufacturing, agriculture continues to be North Dakota's principal pursuit, and the processing of grain, meat, and dairy products is vital to such cities as Fargo, Grand Forks, Minot, and Bismarck. The Missouri and Red rivers, once the major transportation routes, are more important now for their irrigation potential. Several dams have been built, notably Garrison Dam, and a number of federal reclamation projects have been completed as part of the Missouri River basin project. There has also been reforestation. With such attractions as the Badlands, the International Peace Garden on the Canadian border, and recreational facilities provided by reservoirs (resulting from dam building in the 1950s), tourism has become North Dakota's third-ranking source of income, behind agriculture and mineral production.

Government and Higher Education

The state is governed under its 1889 constitution, often amended. The legislature consists of 49 senators and 98 representatives. The governor is elected for a four-year term; Republican Edward Schafer, elected in 1992 and reelected in 1996, was succeeded by fellow Republican John Hoeven, elected in 2000 and reelected in 2004. North Dakota elects two U.S. senators and one representative; it has three electoral votes.

The state's institutions of higher education include Jamestown College, at Jamestown; North Dakota State Univ., at Fargo; and the Univ. of North Dakota, at Grand Forks.

History

The first farmers in the region of whom there is definite knowledge were Native Americans of the Mandan tribe. Other agricultural tribes were the Arikara and the Hidatsa. Seminomadic and nomadic tribes were the Cheyenne, Cree, Sioux, Assiniboin, Crow, and Ojibwa (Chippewa).

With the Louisiana Purchase of 1803 the northwestern half of North Dakota became part of the United States. The southeastern half was acquired from Great Britain in 1818 when the international line with Canada was fixed at the 49th parallel. Earlier the Lewis and Clark expedition had wintered (1804-5) with the Mandan and the North West Company and the Hudson's Bay Company had established trading posts in the Red River valley. These ventures introduced an industry that dominated the region for more than half a century. Within that era the buffalo vanished from the plains and the beaver from the rivers.

From its post at Fort Union, which was established in 1828, John Jacob Astor's American Fur Company gradually gained monopolistic control for a time over the region's trade. Supply and transport were greatly facilitated when a paddlewheel steamer, the Yellowstone, inaugurated steamboat travel on the turbulent upper Missouri in 1832. Additional transportation was provided by the supply caravans of Red River carts, which went westward across the Minnesota prairies and returned to the Mississippi loaded with valuable pelts. In 1837, the introduction of smallpox by settlers decimated the Mandan tribe.

An attempt at agricultural colonization was made at Pembina in 1812 (see Red River Settlement), but the first permanent farming community was not established until 1851, when another group settled at Pembina. This was still the only farm settlement in the future state in 1851 when the Dakota Territory was organized. The territory included lands that would eventually became North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, and Wyoming.

Several military posts had been established starting in 1857 to protect travelers and railroad workers. Even when free land was opened in 1863 and the Northern Pacific RR was chartered in 1864, concern with the Civil War and the eruption of open warfare with Native Americans discouraged any appreciable settlement. Gen. Alfred H. Sully joined Gen. Henry H. Sibley of Minnesota in campaigns against the Sioux in 1863-66. A treaty was signed in 1868. In 1876, after gold was discovered on Native American land in the Black Hills, the unwillingness of the whites to respect treaty agreements led to further war, and the force of George A. Custer was annihilated at the battle of the Little Bighorn in present-day Montana. Ultimately, however, the Sioux under Chief Sitting Bull fled to Canada, where they surrendered voluntarily; they were returned to reservations in the United States.

The first cattle ranch in North Dakota was established in 1878. With the construction of railroads in the 1870s and 80s, thousands of European immigrants, principally Scandinavians, Germans, and Czechs, arrived. They worked the land on their own homesteads or on the large Eastern-financed bonanza wheat fields of the low central prairies. Borrowing the idea from Europe, they founded agricultural cooperatives.

Local politics were rapidly reduced to a struggle between the agrarian groups and the corporate interests. Alexander McKenzie of the Northern Pacific was for many years the most important figure in the state. Republicans held the elective offices. Agrarian groups formed the Farmers' Alliance and in 1892, three years after North Dakota had achieved statehood, the Farmers' Alliance combined with the Democrats and Populists to elect Eli Shortridge, a Populist, as governor. Later, when the success of the La Follette Progressives in Wisconsin encouraged the growth of the Republican Progressive movement in North Dakota, a fusion with the Democrats elected "Honest John" Burke as governor for three terms (1906-12).

Much of the agrarian discontent was focused on marketing practices of the large grain interests. Although many small cooperative grain elevators were established, they did not prove effective, and the farmers pressed for state-owned grain elevators. When this movement failed in the legislature of 1915, the Nonpartisan League, directed in North Dakota by Arthur C. Townley, was organized on a platform that included state ownership of terminal elevators and flour mills, state inspection of grain and grain dockage, relief of farm improvements from taxation, and rural credit banks operated at cost.

Working primarily with the Republican party because it was the majority party in North Dakota, the league captured the state legislature in 1919 and proceeded to enact virtually its entire platform. This included the establishment of an industrial commission to manage state-owned enterprises and the creation of the Bank of North Dakota to handle public funds and provide low-cost rural credit. The right of recall was also enacted, by which voters could remove an elected official. However, the reforms were disappointing in operation.

Dissension arose within the league, and the Independent Voters Association was organized to represent the conservative Republican position. The industrial commission was accused of maladministration, and the provision of recall was exercised three times, the first against Gov. L. J. Frazier in 1921. William Langer, who had been active with both the Nonpartisan League and the Independent Voters Association, was elected governor in 1932 running as a Nonpartisan. Langer was convicted on a federal charge of misconduct in office in 1934, although the conviction was later reversed. Langer again became governor in 1936, running as an individual candidate and not on the ticket of either party; subsequently he was elected to the U.S. Senate four times.

The state's heavy dependence on wheat and petroleum has made it unusually vulnerable to fluctuations in those markets. Red River flooding in 1997 devastated Grand Forks, adding to economic problems. In recent years North Dakota has become more urbanized, and telecommunications and high-tech manufacturing have created jobs, but between 1990 and 2000 it had the slowest rate of population growth of all the states.

State (pop., 2008 est.: 804,194), north-central U.S. It covers 77,117 sq mi (199,732 sq km); its capital is Pierre. South Dakota is bordered on the north by North Dakota, on the east by Minnesota and Iowa, on the south by Nebraska, and on the west by Wyoming and Montana. The state has three main regions—the eastern prairie; the central Great Plains, which contain the Badlands; and the Black Hills to the west. The Missouri River bisects it from north to south. The French explored the area in the 18th century and sold it to the U.S. as part of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. The Lewis and Clark Expedition spent about seven weeks there in 1804. The Dakota Territory was created in 1861, but settlement was sparse until the Black Hills gold rush of 1875–76 swelled the population. Intermittent wars between the Sioux and settlers occurred until the massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890. South Dakota became the 40th U.S. state in 1889. Farming and related industries form the state's economic base. It is a leader in cattle and hog production, and its main crops are grains. Tourism is a major industry; attractions include Mount Rushmore, Wind Cave National Park, Badlands National Park, and Jewel Cave National Monument.

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City (pop., 2000: 123,975), southeastern South Dakota, U.S. Founded in 1857, the area was abandoned in 1862 following an Indian uprising. With the establishment of Fort Dakota on the site in 1865 the settlers gradually returned. Sioux Falls is the state's largest city, and it is a commercial and financial centre in a livestock-farming region, with one of the largest livestock markets in the U.S. Nearby was one of the world's first commercial nuclear power plants, decommissioned in 1967. The Earth Resource Observation Systems (EROS) Data Center is located in the city.

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A group of related North American Indian peoples living mostly in the Plains and speaking related langauges within the Siouan language stock. They comprise the Dakota-speaking Santee (Eastern Sioux), the Nakota-speaking Yankton, and the Lakota-speaking Teton (Western Sioux), each of which in turn has lesser divisions (e.g., Blackfoot, Oglala). The name Sioux is a French derivation of an Ojibwa name for “enemy” or “snake.” Before the 17th century the various groups of Sioux had lived in present Minnesota and around Lake Superior; conflict related to the fur trade displaced them to the Plains. There they adopted a nomadic way of life, hunting buffalo, living in tepees, emphasizing valour in warfare, and practicing the sun dance. The Sioux fought American incursions into their territory in 1862 and again in the 1860s and '70s. Sioux resistance to American colonialism culminated in the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876, a great indigenous victory. However, economic pressure eventually caused most Sioux to surrender and move to reservations, where many adopted the Ghost Dance religion. In 1890 the U.S. Seventh Cavalry massacred Sioux civilians at Wounded Knee, also the location of an occupation by the American Indian Movement in 1973. The Sioux numbered about 160,000 in the early 21st century. Seealso Sitting Bull.

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