Crossing the Badlands from the east, native people and later gold miners encountered a nine-mile wall of worn rock and earth. The community of Wall gets its name from this geological formation. 

Founded in 1907 after homesteading in western South Dakota was opened to white settlers and the Chicago and Norh Western railroad built its line from the Missouri River to the Black Hills, the town served as a retail hub for the surrounding farming and ranching community.

After Ted and Dorothy Hustead founded Wall Drug in 1931 and made the store famous with their far-flung billboard campaign, the community became a destination for tourists headed to and from the Black Hills. 

South Dakota Magazine writer Paul Higbee wrote an in-depth profile of the Wall in 2011.

Museums, Libraries & Archives

The Wall Community Library is located at 407 Main Street. The library is open on Wednesdays from 1-8 p.m., Thursdays from 9 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. and from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m., and Fridays from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Statistics on the library's collection and services are available here. A list of the library's board of trustees and staff is available here.

The Wounded Knee Museum in Wall, South Dakota, uses “exhibits and photographs [to] provide a vivid picture of events surrounding the Wounded Knee Massacre” that took place on December 29, 1890.

The National Grasslands Visitor Center, operated by the U.S. Forest Service, offers more than 20 exhbits on the ecology and history of the Great Plains and America's grasslands. It is located at 708 Main Street in Wall.

Founded in 1931, world-famous Wall Drug offers an emporium of clothing, books and souvenirs for visitors. The cafe also features an impressive collection of paintings by artists from the region. A history of Wall Drug is available here.

Historical Photos and Documents Online

The Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress has a handful of images of Wall and the surrounding area including a sequence of images taken of the Minuteman Missle Silo near Interior, South Dakota. There are also dozens of photographs related to the Badlands including images made by photographer Carol Highsmith in 2009 and photographs shot by Arthur Rothstein for the Farm Security Administration during the Depression.

Wall was home to 766 people, according to the 2010 Census.  With a median age of 47.1 years, the population of Wall is older than the rest of Pennington County. Since the 2000 Census, Wall's population has diminished by 6.3 percent. In the city of Wall, there are 348 people per square mile.

The majority (88.9 percent) of people in Wall are white. American Indians constitute 7.0 percent of Wall’s population and 1.0 percent are Hispanic. In 2010, 3.8 percent of the population reported belonging to more than one race.

The community included 359 households in 2010. Only one in five of these households had children under the age of 18. Households with both a husband and wife living together accounted for about half of the total. Single parents (males and female) comprised roughly a third of the households with children. Four out of ten households were made up of a single individual living alone.

Of the 436 housing units identified by the Census, 359 (82.3 percent) were occupied. Just over 9 percent of the units were classified as seasonal, recreational or occasional use. Homeowners accounted for 70.5 percent of all the occupied housing units. 

For an overview of the 2010 U.S. Census data for Wall, see below.

Students in the Wall School District take the annual Dakota STEP test to ensure that the district is making adequate yearly progress (AYP) in reading and math. According the State of South Dakota's report card, Wall students achieved AYP in all categories in all grades tested in elementary, middle and high schools in the spring of 2011. Wall's high school graduation rate was 93.7 percent in 2011, lower than the 100 percent rate posted in 2010 but higher than the statewide average of 83.3 percent.

During the 2010-2011 academic year, the Wall School District's fall enrollment was 254 in grades K-12. With a 1.6 percent dropout rate, the district graduated 31 students. Twenty-three students took the ACT exam. The average composite score was 21.0. To view a statistical profile of funding, student and staff data, see the South Dakota Department of Education's 2010-2011 Profile of Wall School District.

Local Government

The Wall City Council includes six members, two elected from each ward in the community. The mayor is elected at large. Each council person serves a staggered two-year term. City Council agendas are available on the city's website, as are minutes of meetings in 2010 and 2011. City ordinances regulate municipal operations and a host of issues relating to public safety.

Public Safety

In an arid region, water is a critical municipal issue. In 2010, the City of Wall released a report on drinking water in the community. Drawing on local wells, the city serves more than 818 customers an average of 165,300 gallons of water per day. The study found that the relative susceptibility of Wall's drinking water supply to contamination is low.

Community health services are available at Wall Health Services at 112 Seventh Avenue. Phone: 605-279-2149.

Wall's economy is driven by tourism, the needs of the surrounding agricultural community, government employment and the headquarters operations of Golden West Telecommunications. According to the South Dakota Governor's Office of Economic Development, the Wall School District is the leading employer with 70 employees. Golden West employs 60 people and Wall Drug approximately 50. 

A general profile of the Wall community and its economic characteristics can be created on South Dakota Governor's Office of Economic Development interactive website. The Wall Chamber of Commerce provides statistics and information useful to businesses considering locating in Wall.