County Past
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Hand County, South Dakota

Historic newspapers, landmarks, and county history layers for genealogists and local historians.

—newspaper titles
—digitized titles
8historic places
—earliest paper
1873formed
3,145pop. 2020
21cemeteries
—CW battlefields

At a glance

Summary

The National Register of Historic Places includes 8 listed properties in the county, first listed in 1982. Most listings are in or near Miller, Ree Heights, Danforth.

Summary generated automatically from the source data on this page.

Newspapers

Library of Congress

Newspaper directory data for South Dakota is not yet loaded on this site. Browse Hand titles at the Library of Congress.

National Register of Historic Places

NPS NRHP

4 of 8 listings mapped; some locations are restricted by NPS to protect sensitive sites.

8 listed properties
PropertyCityTypeListed
Archaeological Site 39HD115Ree HeightsSite2023
Archeological Site 39HD22DanforthSite1984
Hand County Courthouse and JailMillerBuilding1994
Jones, Mack, HouseMillerBuilding2007
McWhorter, Port and Helen, HouseMillerBuilding2017
Miller Ree Creek BridgeMillerStructure1988
South Dakota Dept. of Transportation Bridge No. 30-257-400MillerStructure1993
St. Mary's Church, School and ConventZellBuilding1982

Source: National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Property links open NRHP nomination files at the National Archives.

County formation

Newberry AHCB

Hand was formed in 1873 (1873-01-08) from Buffalo.

HAND created by Dakota Territory in present South Dakota from BUFFALO.

Source: Newberry Library, Atlas of Historical County Boundaries.

Population by decade

Census

Hand County population from 1880 to 2020 (Census historical series).

9,4854,819153188019201950196020002020
188019001920194019501960198020002020
1534,5258,7787,1667,1496,7124,9483,7413,145

Sources: U.S. Census Bureau historical county population (Forstall 1790–1990) and public-domain / CC0 county population series through 2020.

Cemeteries & historical places

USGS GNIS

21 cemeteries and 2 historical populated places (ghost towns / former settlements) recorded in USGS GNIS for this county.

Cemeteries — 21 of 21 listed
NameLatLon
Alden Cemetery44.67781-99.12033
Beulah Cemetery44.60608-98.80648
Burdette Cemetery44.70035-98.78793
Cedar Cemetery44.27716-99.22396
Ebenezer Baptist Cemetery44.21031-98.90556
G A R Cemetery44.50775-98.9862
Howell Cemetery44.7758-98.97704
IOOF Hillcrest Cemetery44.52171-99.00074
Mondamin Cemetery44.21571-99.12317
Morningside Cemetery44.5147-99.19065
Mount Calvary Cemetery44.783-99.10996
New Zion Cemetery44.20437-98.82127
Orient - Prairieview Cemetery44.88052-99.08926
Rosehill Cemetery44.29766-98.77262
Saint Anns Cemetery44.5222-98.9737
Saint Josephs Catholic Cemetery44.45707-98.70999
Saint Lawrence Cemetery44.52812-98.93306
Saint Marys Catholic Cemetery44.89479-98.72839
Saint Michaels Cemetery44.83025-99.11093
Sunbeam Cemetery44.67775-98.8412
Wessington Cemetery44.45699-98.71144
Historical populated places — 2 of 2
NameLatLon
Florence44.69165-98.98927
Sweetland44.34054-98.98482

Source: USGS Geographic Names Information System (public domain). Cemeteries from the 2021 NationalFile archive; historical places from GNIS HistoricalFeatures topical extract.

Historical markers

HMdb link

Marker text and photos from the Historical Marker Database (HMdb) are not embedded here. HMdb allows non-commercial reuse with attribution, but commercial/compensated use needs written permission; this is a commercial site, so we only link out.

Search HMdb for Hand County, South Dakota

Terms: hmdb.org/copyright.asp. Linking is encouraged by HMdb.