Badlands National Park | |
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IUCN category II (national park) | |
![]() Badlands National Park | |
Location | South Dakota, United States |
Nearest city | Rapid City, South Dakota |
Coordinates | 43°45′N 102°30′W / 43.750°N 102.500°W |
Area | 242,756 acres (982.40 km2)[1] |
Established | January 29, 1939 November 10, 1978 as a National Park | as a National Monument
Visitors | 1,008,942 (in 2018)[2] |
Governing body | National Park Service |
Website | Badlands National Park |
Badlands National Park is an American national park in southwestern South Dakota. The park protects 242,756 acres (379.3 sq mi; 982.4 km2)[1] of sharply eroded rocks, and the largest undisturbed prairie in the United States. The National Park Service manages the park. The South Unit is co-managed with the Oglala Lakota tribe.[3]
The Badlands Wilderness protects 64,144 acres (100.2 sq mi; 259.6 km2) of the park as a designated wilderness area.[4] It is a site where the black-footed ferret, one of the most endangered mammals in the world, was reintroduced to the wild.[5]
The South Unit, or Stronghold District,[3] includes sites of 1890s Ghost Dances,[6] a former United States Air Force bomb and gunnery range,[7] and Red Shirt Table, the park's highest point at 3,340 feet (1,020 m).[8]
Authorized as Badlands National Monument on March 4, 1929, it was not established until January 25, 1939. Badlands was redesignated a national park on November 10, 1978.[9]
The park also administers the nearby Minuteman Missile National Historic Site. The movies Dances with Wolves (1990) and Thunderheart (1992) were partially filmed in Badlands National Park.[10]
The cultural centerpiece of this section is the Stronghold Table, where the Oglala Sioux danced the Ghost Dance for the last time in 1890.