Portal:South Dakota

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The South Dakota Portal

South Dakota (/dəˈkoʊtə/ ^ⓘ də-KOH-tə; Sioux: Dakȟóta itókaga, pronounced [daˈkˣota iˈtokaga]) is a landlocked state in the North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Dakota Sioux tribe, which comprises a large portion of the population with nine reservations currently in the state and has historically dominated the territory. South Dakota is the 17th largest by area, but the 5th least populous, and the 5th least densely populated of the 50 United States. Pierre is the state capital, and Sioux Falls, with a population of about 213,900, is South Dakota's most populous city. The state is bisected by the Missouri River, dividing South Dakota into two geographically and socially distinct halves, known to residents as "East River" and "West River". South Dakota is bordered by North Dakota to the north, Minnesota to the east, Iowa to the southeast, Nebraska to the south, Wyoming to the west, and Montana to the northwest.

Humans have inhabited the area for several millennia, with the Sioux becoming dominant by the early 19th century. In the late 19th century, European-American settlement intensified after a gold rush in the Black Hills and the construction of railroads from the east. Encroaching miners and settlers triggered a number of Indian wars, ending with the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890. As the southern part of the former Dakota Territory, South Dakota became a state on November 2, 1889, simultaneously with North Dakota. They are the 39th and 40th states admitted to the union; President Benjamin Harrison shuffled the statehood papers before signing them so that no one could tell which became a state first.

Key events in the 20th century included the Dust Bowl and Great Depression, increased federal spending during the 1940s and 1950s for agriculture and defense, and an industrialization of agriculture that has reduced family farming. Eastern South Dakota is home to most of the state's population, and the area's fertile soil is used to grow a variety of crops. West of the Missouri River, ranching is the predominant agricultural activity, and the economy is more dependent on tourism and defense spending. Most of the Native American reservations are in West River. The Black Hills, a group of low pine-covered mountains sacred to the Sioux, is in the southwest part of the state. Mount Rushmore, a major tourist destination, is there. South Dakota has a temperate continental climate, with four distinct seasons and precipitation ranging from moderate in the east to semi-arid in the west. The state's ecology features species typical of a North American grassland biome. (Full article...)

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Theresa B. "Huck" Two Bulls (born October 23, 1949, Oglala Sioux; died November 21, 2020) was an attorney, prosecutor and politician in the United States and the Oglala Sioux Tribe. In 2004 she was elected as Democratic member of the South Dakota Senate, representing the 27th district, the first American Indian woman to be elected to the state legislature. She served until 2008. That year Two Bulls was elected as president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe of the Pine Ridge Reservation, the second woman to serve in this position. She served one term, which was two years.

In elective office, Two Bulls particularly worked to develop stronger relationships between tribal and local and state governments. She also served on a United States Department of Justice task force to develop guidelines for and implementation of a study to reduce violence against Indian women. In 2015 she was secretary-treasurer of the National Congress of American Indians. (Full article...)

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Entries here consist of Good and Featured articles, which meet a core set of high editorial standards.

Lawrence in 1939

Ernest Orlando Lawrence (August 8, 1901 – August 27, 1958) was an American nuclear physicist and winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1939 for his invention of the cyclotron. He is known for his work on uranium-isotope separation for the Manhattan Project, as well as for founding the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

A graduate of the University of South Dakota and University of Minnesota, Lawrence obtained a PhD in physics at Yale in 1925. In 1928, he was hired as an associate professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley, becoming the youngest full professor there two years later. In its library one evening, Lawrence was intrigued by a diagram of an accelerator that produced high-energy particles. He contemplated how it could be made compact, and came up with an idea for a circular accelerating chamber between the poles of an electromagnet. The result was the first cyclotron. (Full article...)

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Dakota, Minnesota and Eastern Railroad List of colleges and universities in South Dakota Geography of South Dakota Flag of Sioux Falls, South Dakota Brock Lesnar 1999 South Dakota Learjet crash Amanda Clement George McGovern Tornado outbreak of May 4–6, 2007 Missouri River Sitting Bull Ex parte Crow Dog Mamie Shields Pyle Cecil E. Harris Eagle Woman Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868)

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The following are images from various South Dakota-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Deadwood, like many other Black Hills towns, was founded after the discovery of gold. (from History of South Dakota)
Image 2Craven Canyon petroglyphs in the Black Hills. (from History of South Dakota)
Image 3Detail from a map drawn by the Lewis and Clark Expedition, showing much of what would become eastern and central South Dakota. (from History of South Dakota)
Image 4Huron (left) and Pierre (right) issued rival maps that claimed each as the best place voters should choose for the new state capital in 1890. (from History of South Dakota)
Image 5Karl Bodmer's portrait of an Arikara warrior, early 1840s. (from History of South Dakota)
Image 6Map showing the general locations of the tribes and subtribes of the Sioux by the late 18th century; current reservations are shown in orange. (from History of South Dakota)
Image 7A rodeo at Days of '76 in Deadwood. (from Culture of South Dakota)
Image 8A South Dakota farm during the Dust Bowl, 1936 (from History of South Dakota)
Image 9Author Laura Ingalls Wilder used her experiences growing up near De Smet as the basis for four of her novels. (from Culture of South Dakota)

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... that US president Calvin Coolidge left Mystic, South Dakota, in a lumber wagon?
... that a South Dakota radio station once played nothing but various recordings of "Amazing Grace"?
... that Garretson, South Dakota, was named after businessman Arthur Samuel Garretson?
... that when the University of South Dakota started a radio station, the transmitter was built by student and future Nobel Prize winner Ernest Lawrence?
... that the Dillinger Gang's 1934 robbery of the Security National Bank in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, was depicted in the 2009 film Public Enemies?
... that the founding owner of a South Dakota TV station became known for industry ads calling him "a helluva salesman"?

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Largest cities

Cities in South Dakota, with their populations (as of July 1, 2020, as enumerated by the 2020 United States census):

2020 rank	City	2020 census^[1]	2010 census^[2]	Change	County
1	Sioux Falls †	192,517	153,888	+25.10%	Minnehaha Lincoln
2	Rapid City †	74,703	67,956	+9.93%	Pennington
3	Aberdeen †	28,495	26,091	+9.21%	Brown
4	Brookings †	23,377	22,056	+5.99%	Brookings
5	Watertown †	22,655	21,482	+5.46%	Codington
6	Mitchell †	15,660	15,254	+2.66%	Davison
7	Yankton †	15,411	14,454	+6.62%	Yankton
8	Huron †	14,263	12,592	+13.27%	Beadle
9	Pierre ‡	14,091	13,646	+3.26%	Hughes
10	Spearfish	12,193	10,494	+16.19%	Lawrence

†	County seat
‡	State capital and county seat

See List of cities in South Dakota for a full list.

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