Bear Butte, South Dakota Poster

"Bear Butte State Park, South Dakota" by Catherine Sherman. Bear Butte, which looks like a sleeping bear from a distance, is a geological laccolith feature east of Sturgis, South Dakota, which was established as a State Park in 1961. I've been visiting Bear Butte since I was a toddler. My grandparents lived in Sturgis, so we visited regularly. I still love to make a pilgrimage there. When I was ten years old, I climbed to the top of Bear Butte with my parents and four younger siblings (number six was not yet born.) My father carried my one-year-old sister to the peak. I remember it as a steep, narrow trail. The peak rises 1,253.5 feet (382.1 m) above the surrounding plain and is 4,426 feet (1,349 m) above sea level. I climbed it again in my 30s with my husband. I haven't attempted the climb on later visits. (I know my limits...) This geological formation is one of several intrusions of igneous rock in the Black Hills that formed millions of years ago, such as Devils Tower in eastern Wyoming. The mountain is sacred to many American Indian tribes who come to Bear Butte to hold religious ceremonies. Bear Butte is called Matȟó Pahá or Mato Paha, or Bear Mountain, by the Lakota, or Sioux. To the Cheyenne, it is known as Noahȧ-vose ("giving hill") or Náhkȯhe-vose ("bear hill"). Ezra Bovee homesteaded on the southern slopes of the mountain, and by the time of World War II, he and his family were the legal owners of the site. My paternal grandmother's sister married one of Ezra's sons. In the spring of 1945, the Northern Cheyenne received permission from Bovee to hold a ceremony at Bear Butte to pray for the end of World War II. The Bovee family welcomed their interest in the mountain, and the Bovees continued to encourage native religious ceremonies. In the mid-1950s Ezra Bovee led an effort to make Bear Butte a national park. After his death, his family continued the campaign. When federal interest in the project waned, the South Dakota state government took action, and Bear Butte became a state park in 1961 and was registered as a National Historic Landmark in 1981.