Death and the Devil

The day after we saw Mount Rushmore, we went to the Devils Tower in Wyoming in the morning and Deadwood in the afternoon.

The Devils Tower is really misnamed. It was known as Bear’s Lodge by the tribes who lived in the area, and given the name Devils Tower by a later explorer. To this day it remains a sacred worship site to the Native American tribes of the region, and prayer cloths can be seen tied to the trees.

John by a big rock

Prayer Cloth

Deadwood was an interesting historic town that reminded me in many ways of Eureka Springs and Jackson, Wyoming. We saw a reenactment of Wild Bill Hickok’s death and a small museum that was quite informative about local history.

Skulls, Bones, and Minerals

After seeing the Crazy Horse Memorial, we went back to Rapid City to find the Museum of Geology at the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology.  It was a small museum that packed a big punch: large dinosaur fossils, skeletons of more recent fauna, and a section on minerals that included a US flag made of red, white, and blue minerals.