Opened in 1906 the Matthews Opera House was the setting for stage productions and traveling shows through the 1930’s. Built by local Wyoming rancher, Thomas Matthews at a cost of $50,000, the Opera House opened on December 3, 1906 with a political farce-comedy called “The Lion and the Mouse”. Throughout the next 10 years the popularity of the Opera House remained unquestioned. Many traveling repertory companies paid repeated visits to the Matthews during that time. However, as the decade drew to a close in 1919, competition from “moving pictures” developed in Spearfish and fewer live performances were scheduled. Renamed “The Princess Theater” in 1920, the Matthews was run primarily as a movie house over the next 10 years with occasional live shows still playing on the stage. However, the “golden age” at the Opera House came to a halt in 1930 when the owner of the Princess Theater moved out and opened a new building down the street.

Over the next 25 years the Opera House was used for varied events from a practice basketball court, to a shooting gallery and occasional dance hall. But the elegance of the interior faded as the building fell into general disuse by the mid 1950’s. Broken windows provided easy access to pigeons that roosted among the stage hangings. An effort by local college students in 1956 and ‘57 was attempted to revive the Opera House. The students brought a series of melodramas to the stage during the two summers, but while community support was high, graduation of cast members and financial concerns brought a quick end to the venture. Once more the Opera House went dark and continued to deteriorate.

By 1966, the Opera House had been little used for nearly a decade, when another band of intrepid students from Black Hills State College formed a theater company for the summer months and began a small scale renovation of the interior. Known as “Stagecoach Theater”, the student’s efforts were longer lasting than 10 years earlier. What soon became a summer favorite, “The Phantom of the Matthews Opera House”, written by Paul Higbee, opened in 1976. Summer audiences continued to grow through the 80’s, but the conditions of the Opera House were anything but comfortable. The building wasn’t air-conditioned and there was only one single public toilet. By the mid 1980’s it was determined that serious restoration work would be needed to preserve and protect the Opera House if it were to reach its centennial year. The Spearfish Downtown Association took the first step and formed the non-profit Matthews Opera House Society. The building was leased from current owner Mike Kelly with a 95 year, rent free agreement that the restoration would proceed on a timely basis. The first restoration phase was completed by 1989. Work continued into the 90’s and was completed by the end of 2006, the official centennial date of the opening of the Matthews Opera House.

Today, the Matthews Opera House is the centerpiece of the Spearfish Arts Center and the home to an active community theater. It is once more an ongoing scene of live theater, concerts and art events throughout the year.

Fort Laramie was a significant 19th century trading post and diplomatic site located in the U.S. state of Wyoming. During the middle 19th century, it was a primary stopping point on the Oregon Trail and the Mormon Trail and was, along with Bent’s Fort on the Arkansas River, the most significant economic hub of commerce in the region. In the 1840s it was taken over by the United States Army to protect travelers on the Oregon, California and Mormon trails.

Today, the remaining structures are preserved as the Fort Laramie National Historic Site by the National Park Service.

All aboard for a twenty mile trip on a vintage steam train like the ones that helped settle the great american west. The trip takes 1 hour to Keystone, where there is a 15 minute break and then a 1 hour trip back to Hill City. Train is handicap accessible. In Hill City they have a chair lift to raise the wheelchair in the train. The 7:30am trip utilizes a vintage diesel engine.

Booking Instructions: This attraction requires a date and time specific reservation. Please select the number of adults and your date from the drop down box for your preferred tour time. “Add” to your itinerary. Then select the number of children, if applicable, for the same date and tour time. “Add” to your itinerary.

Wall Drug Store, often referred to simply as “Wall Drug”, is a tourist attraction located in the town of Wall, South Dakota. It is a sprawling shopping mall consisting of a drug store, gift shop, restaurants and various other stores. Unlike a traditional shopping mall, all the stores at Wall Drug operate under a single entity instead of being individually run stores.

History

The small town drugstore made its first step towards fame when it was purchased by Ted Hustead in 1931. Hustead was a Nebraska native and pharmacist who was looking for a small town with a Catholic church in which to establish his business. He bought Wall Drug, located in a 231-person town in what he referred to as “the middle of nowhere”, and strove to make a living. Business was very slow until his wife, Dorothy, got the idea to advertise free ice water to parched travellers heading to the newly-opened Mount Rushmore monument sixty miles to the west. From that time on business was brisk. Wall Drug grew into a cowboy-themed shopping mall/department store. Wall Drug includes a western art museum, a chapel based on the one found at New Melleray Abbey near Dubuque, Iowa, and an 80-foot (24 m) Apatosaurus that can be seen right off Interstate 90. It was designed by Emmet Sullivan who also created the dinosaurs at Dinosaur Park and Dinosaur World.

The marketing campaign

Wall Drug earns much of its fame from its self-promotion. Billboards advertising the establishment can be seen for hundreds of miles throughout South Dakota and the neighboring states. In addition, many visitors of Wall Drug have erected signs throughout the world announcing the miles to Wall Drug from famous locations, treating it as a geodesic datum. By 1981 Wall Drug was claiming it was giving away 20,000 cups of water per day during the peak tourist season, lasting from Memorial Day until Labor Day, and during the hottest days of the summer.

Wall Drug Today

To date, Wall Drug still offers free ice water, but as they have become more popular, they have started to offer free bumper stickers, signs to aid in promotion, and coffee for 5 cents. One popular free bumper sticker reads “Where the heck is Wall Drug?”, “How many miles to Wall Drug?”, and “Where in the world is Wall Drug?”.

Back when the U.S. Air Force was still operating Minuteman Missile silos in the Western South Dakota plains, Wall Drug used to offer free coffee and donuts to the service men/women if they stopped in on their way to/from Ellsworth AFB (50 miles West on Interstate 90). Wall Drug continues to offer free coffee and a donut to honeymooners, veterans, priests, hunters, truck drivers, and other travelers.
[edit] Media references

Wall Drug has been featured in Time magazine as one of the largest tourist attractions in the north. They have over 500 miles (800 km) of billboards on Interstate 90, stretching from Minnesota to Billings, Montana. Wall Drug spends an estimated $400,000 on billboard signs every year. The history of Wall Drug was told in a two episode story arc of the podcast The Radio Adventures of Dr. Floyd.

Wall Drug was also referenced in the “Heart of Winter” episode of the post-apocalyptic CBS drama Jericho, when a shopping bag from Wall Drug was found at an abandoned campsite in Kansas.

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