Blackhawk, South Dakota

20 stories, landmarks & places within ~20 miles — the same local lore RoadyGoat plays as you drive through.

• Cassidy House (Rapid City, South Dakota) · 6.4 mi · Scraped Hmdb

  Ever wonder what a house made of steel looks like? You're near one right now! The Cassidy House is a rare example of a Lustron home, a prefabricated steel house that was briefly popular after World War II. Founded by…

• Dinosaur Park · 6.7 mi · Scraped Hmdb

  Imagine spotting a T-Rex from your car window, not in a museum, but perched on a hilltop overlooking a city. That's Dinosaur Park. Back in 1936, Rapid City built this park to lure tourists heading to Mount Rushmore. The…

• Pap Madison Cabin · 6.7 mi · Scraped Hmdb

  Ever wonder what the very first European settlers in the Black Hills called home? You're about to see it! This rustic log cabin isn't just old; it's the oldest Euro-American building in the entire Black Hills area. Step…

• City of Presidents · 7.1 mi

  In downtown Rapid City, the presidents are out walking the sidewalks. Life-size bronze statues of American presidents stand on nearly every street corner, the 'City of Presidents' project that began in 2000 after a…

• Mystic, South Dakota · 16.1 mi · Scraped Hmdb

  You're approaching a place where the echoes of a bustling mining town still linger: Mystic, South Dakota. In 1876, gold brought prospectors here, and the settlement was first known as Sitting Bull. The promise of riches…

• Black Hills National Cemetery · 16.6 mi · Scraped Hmdb

  Pay your respects at this solemn site, the final resting place for over 29,000 veterans. This land became a national cemetery after World War II, a response to the growing need for burial space for those who served. In…

• The Cavalry Post That Guarded the Gold · 18.7 mi · Things to Do

  Fort Meade was built in 1878 just east of Sturgis to protect the illegal gold settlements in the Black Hills. The irony was thick. The Army was guarding miners…

• Fort Meade (South Dakota) · 19.1 mi · Scraped Hmdb

  From the Indian Wars to World War II, Fort Meade played a pivotal role in the history of the American West. Established in 1878, the fort's original purpose was to protect the growing white settlements in the northern…

• Nine Riders and a Race That Changed Everything · 19.7 mi · Things to Do

  In 1938 a motorcycle dealer named Pappy Hoel gathered nine riders for a race through the Black Hills outside Sturgis South Dakota. That was the first Sturgis…

• Mount Rushmore · 19.8 mi · Scraped Hmdb

  Gutzon Borglum blasted away 450,000 tons of rock to create this colossal monument to American presidents. Borglum began sculpting Mount Rushmore in 1927. He envisioned a monumental sculpture of four U.S. presidents:…

• Mount Rushmore · 19.8 mi · Things to Do

  Four presidents carved into a granite mountainside. America's most iconic landmark.

• Mount Rushmore: Faces in the Granite · 19.8 mi · Historical

  Over fourteen years, sculptor Gutzon Borglum and 400 workers carved the sixty-foot faces of four presidents into the Black Hills granite, creating one of America's most iconic monuments.

• The Horse That Survived Custer's Last Stand · 19.8 mi · Things to Do

  After the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876 soldiers found a badly wounded buckskin horse standing among the dead. His name was Comanche and he had carried…

• Sturgis: Nine Riders and the Birth of a Legend · 19.8 mi · Historical

  The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally began in 1938 when nine riders competed for a $500 prize on a half-mile dirt track — today it draws hundreds of thousands of riders annually to the Black Hills.

• When They Lit the Streets on Fire · 19.8 mi · Things to Do

  In the 1970s the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally had a wild streak that would be hard to imagine today. At the end of the 1975 event riders doused the streets of…

• Pappy Hoel and the Indian Motorcycle · 19.8 mi · Things to Do

  Clarence 'Pappy' Hoel ran an Indian motorcycle dealership in Sturgis and loved racing more than selling bikes. In 1938 he founded the Jackpine Gypsies…

• The Colonel Who Never Saw His Town · 19.8 mi · Things to Do

  The city of Sturgis is named after Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis who commanded the 7th Cavalry at Fort Meade. Sturgis had a personal grudge against the Lakota. His…

• The Treaty That Was Broken for Gold · 19.9 mi · Things to Do

  The 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie promised the Black Hills to the Lakota Sioux for as long as the grass shall grow. Six years later Custer's expedition found…

• The First Rally T-Shirts Were All Maroon · 19.9 mi · Things to Do

  In 1940 just two years after the first Sturgis Rally someone had the idea to sell printed t-shirts advertising the event. Every single shirt was maroon. There…

• Every Cavalry Regiment Served Here · 19.9 mi · Things to Do

  During the great western expansion nearly every cavalry regiment in the entire United States Army rotated through Fort Meade outside Sturgis. The post was one…