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Dubbed Mako Sica by the Lakotas and les Mauvaises Terres by the French, South Dakota’s White River Badlands is famous for its stunning vistas of saw-toothed ridges, dry-wash canyons, and looming mesas and pinnacles, which attract millions of visitors to Badlands National Park every year. Over the centuries, this harsh, unforgiving environment has also enticed generations of American Indians, fur traders, trailblazers, would-be tycoons, paleontologists, gold miners, homesteaders, and ranchers, who have either found refuge here or tried, and often failed, to eke out a living.
The White River Badlands: Its History and Characters examines each of these attempts to lay claim to the Badlands. Philip S. Hall, son of multigenerational Badlands ranchers, has spent over half a century exploring and researching this spectacular, forbidding landscape and those intrepid souls who have called it home. As the next chapter in its history is written, will the Badlands prove to be as immutable as it seems, impervious to the conceits of man? You be the judge.
Reviews
“Author Philip S. Hall explores the South Dakota Badlands in segments, from the Lakotas, fossil hunting and gold-rush era through homesteaders, cattle barons, mineral leasing and into the present day. While many might be familiar with the rugged landscape of the area, which ranges roughly from Crawford, Nebraska, and follows the White River to near Belvidere, South Dakota, fewer likely know the stories of the people who attempted to settle and tame the land that the Lakota referred to as Mako Sica (land bad). Hall writes of the first towns and remaining ones, provides maps and photographs, and draws upon his ancestral heritage of ranching in the Badlands to create a vivid image of the area and its history. He also explains how Badlands National Park came into being. This well-researched book, written in a conversational manner, offers readers a thought-provoking entrée into the history of the Badlands as well as of South Dakota and the nearby region.” — Lori Van Pelt, Roundup Magazine, April 2026