The badlands region of southwestern South Dakota served as home to several Native American groups for as long as 11,000 years. They have used this area for their hunting grounds. Their descendants were the Lakota Indians who still live in the region.
Located in Imlay Township in South Dakota, Badlands National Park has a Fossil Preparation Lab where the visitor can watch paleontologists at work, literally uncovering the ancient history of the area.
Badlands National Park is home to a population of the United States’ national mammal, the American Bison. as the early 1800s, there were roughly 30 million bison roaming North America. By the late 1800s, however, European settlers cut that number to fewer than 1,000 animals.
Badlands National Park is 70 miles east of Rapid City. The Badlands National Monument was officially created by the proclamation of President Roosevelt on January 25, 1939. Badlands became a national park by an Act of Congress in 1978. The park, established totals 242,756 acres. The North Unit includes the 64,250-acre Badlands Wilderness Area.
The South Unit is within the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and is managed by the National Park Service in cooperation with the Oglala Sioux Tribe under a memorandum of agreement signed in 1976.
Badlands National Park in history
