Overview: "Island in a Sea of Grass"

The Harney Peak Ranch derives its name from the crowning central massif of the Black Hills Range and highest peak east of the Rockies, Harney Peak. The Black Hills, famous in Native American and western lore, are the most ancient and geologically diverse of America’s mountain ranges. Ancient spiritual centers of Native Americans from earliest times, the Black Hills were first discovered by French explorers in the 1700s. The first American-led fur trapping party under Jedediah Smith, forced overland by Indian hostilities on the Missouri and near death from thirst in the Badlands, sought refuge here enroute to discovering the famous South Pass to the Pacific in 1823. The first Americans to find solace in this "Island in a Sea of Grass".

The Oglala Sioux Nation held the sacred "Paha Sapa" (Black Hills) so fiercely that this region was the last settled of the Wild West. The great Panic of 1873 forced the opening of the area as desperate settlers and gold seekers braved all adversity to seek new opportunities. The gold seekers mostly failed and moved on. They missed the true treasure of the land and climate.

When James R. (Pap) Madison joined the Gold Rush, he sought not gold but that same natural bounty and shelter that had drawn both man and beast from time immemorial. His humble but tightly crafted cabin that has survived almost alone from the Gold Rush in downtown Rapid City speaks to the value of care and perseverance. It is not surprising that his family played a leading role in the sweep of western history from the first beginnings to modern times. His cabin was near the blockhouse that protected the first settlers but he was among those who first ventured forth beyond its security to seek the best lands.

The surviving legacy of that spirit, passed down for generations in pioneer hands, is the Harney Peak Ranch. The ranch lands occupy the fertile, first settled delta plain of the mountain-sheltered Rapid Valley adjacent to regionally dominant Rapid City, South Dakota, Gateway to the Black Hills. It has been the historic headquarters ranch for the founders of the state’s most prominent mining, timbering, railroading ranching and rodeo heritage. Its location and setting have made it the centerpiece of the area’s emerging growth as a prestige lifestyle and financial haven. What follows is a written description of the Harney Peak Ranch and its surroundings and attributes.

Property Location and Access:

The Harney Peak Ranch main headquarters is located south of the South Dakota Highway 44 expressway to the new Rapid City Regional Airport. The western property line is also the Rapid City Municipal Boundary along East 39th Street and directly in line with the planned Southeast Corridor perimeter expressway from Interstate 90 to both the southbound Heartland Expressway to Denver and US Highway 16 to Mount Rushmore. The Southeast Corridor Expressway will run parallel to the Ranch property and it’s boundary arterials slightly to their west. The Harney Peak Ranch lands will be conveniently accessible from all of its planned exit points.

The property extends southward in a mile wide strip for three miles with the exception of one neighboring parcel that reduces the width to a half-mile on the eastern side. The East boundary lies along East 53rd Street to the junction with Lamb Road, the westbound perimeter arterial to the Heartland Expressway. The property continues south one mile further. This parcel is approximately 2050 acres and has about four miles of arterial frontage on East 39th and 53rd Streets and Lamb Road and one half mile of frontage on the Highway 44 Expressway. Recent residential development adjoining the ranch had been primarily upscale, rustic-accented ranchettes complementary to future ranch development concepts with equestrian or golf course and resort facilities and high-value housing.

The western portion of the ranch is located one mile west of the main unit and consists of approximately 500 acres of land adjoining the Heartland Expressway one mile south of it’s junction with the Highway 16 Bypass route to the Black Hills. The north boundary adjoins the current Folsom Road connection to the bypass. The south boundary will front on the westward extension of Lamb Road to the Heartland Expressway when that connection is completed. The current frontage consists of about one-half mile on the Folsom Road arterial and one-quarter mile on the Heartland Expressway with about one and one-quarter miles on anticipated future arterial connections. Much of the open real estate to the south is in strong hands. A prime example and likely model for Harney Peak Ranch development is the great Hart Ranch development, a well established integrated recreational and residential community on the vast former Western Cattle Company ranchlands. Their property adjoins the ranch’s west parcel on the south and dominates the Black Hills frontage to the south for many miles.

The Harney Peak Ranch property as a whole occupies about 2500 acres. The location is on a direct axis with and about equidistant from the Rapid City Regional Airport and the fast growing Rapid City Regional Hospital Medical Center complex and a number of satellite research, treatment and teaching institutions. Amongst the most recent are several independent surgical facilities and the University of South Dakota School of Medicine facility. The Rapid City Medical Center has now moved to a new ten million dollar center as well. A combination of accessibility, lifestyle and facilities has lured several world class specialists to the Black Hills. The main medical campus area around Rapid City Regional Hospital now extends south for one full mile. With a minimum of 300 miles to any equivalent facilities, medical sector growth seems assured.

The City of Rapid City has recently purchased a substantial parcel for the new high school campus and community recreation center between the Regional Medical growth center and the Harney Peak Ranch property. They have also joined with the new Western Dakota Vocational-Technical College to share a new expanded joint college/high school technical training campus.

To the north of this site and located between the Ranch and the city center lie the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, National College, The South Dakota State University regional research headquarters and the headquarters campus of the system. Additional community amenities located in this sector include several sports complexes and recreation facilities, the Central States Fair Grounds and the eastern extension on the Greenway open space corridor along Rapid Creek.

The Greenway extends completely through the center of Rapid City, anchored on the west by newly renovated Canyon Lake Park and lined with pedestrian, equestrian and bike paths and sports and cultural facilities. The Elks Country Club and Elks Country Estates planned residential development lie directly adjacent to the Harney Peak Ranch on the western boundary and adjacent to Rapid Creek. The land east of the ranch is substantially developed for the intervening two miles. Beyond that, and for the foreseeable future, municipal waste facilities, Regional Airport air operations zones and changing land characteristics place effective limits on major development. As a result, the ranch lands remain the singular great private open space adjoining the city boundaries. Its protected settings, lakes and rivers and unobstructed mountain views are also unique this close to the central community. Nonetheless, the ranch property is well served by the current transportation plan and the utility infrastructure is at or near the property lines.

Regional Attributes and Assets

Long before Interstate 90 or even the frontier rail lines converged on the area, Rapid City’s location made it the natural terminus and transit point from the fur trade days and even before as a universal Native American spiritual center. From gold rush pack trains and freight wagons to Interstate 90 and transecting optical cable corridors it continues in much the same vein today. In fact, South Dakota currently has more miles of optical cabling than any state in the union.

Major current economic assets include several electronic and scientific manufacturing and development concerns as well as national financial and fulfillment companies. These profit-conscious enterprises as well as many individuals have combined the benefits of South Dakota’s tax and banking shelter benefits with the tranquillity of western mountain lifestyles to make the Black Hills a major emerging lifestyle and financial haven.

In recent years, some of America’s wealthiest individuals have quietly sought refuse nearby and some not so quietly! Kevin Costner’s new 140 million dollar Dunbar resort at Deadwood represents the latter. Costner plans to transport guests from the Rapid City Regional Airport to Rapid City and on to Dunbar via frontier style railroad train on tracks adjacent to the Harney Peak Ranch main headquarters.

A fortuitous conjunction of regional health care and retirement support assets combined with continuing state and community quality-of-life awards drive an ongoing retirement influx. Reinforcing this sector are a regional school of nursing and five state and federal hospital facilities including one each at Rapid City and Ellsworth AFB.

Rapid City is the prime supply point for a Black Hills regional population of approximately two hundred thousand people including the mineral industries and the Wyoming oil and coal basin directly west across the border. Regional natural assets include five nearby National Park Service treasures, the Black Hills, Badlands and the Missouri River lake chain. Ellsworth Air Force Base, one of the key installations in the defense network, was born of the region’s superior flight operations weather and is a preferred duty station for Air Force personnel. It supplies both a strong economic base and high quality labor pool to the area. Air Force retirees frequently settler in the Black Hills for top health care and temperate weather.

Property Characteristics and Amenities

Harney Peak Ranch is comprised of a number of pioneer homesteads from the 1870s. The southern end of the ranch is also part of a major frontier cattle shipping point, Warbonnet (or Brennan) Townsite. A number of structures from this era are still in use on the ranch today. The general topography of the property tends to screen it from the nearby city and development and to offer generally uncluttered views of Harney Peak, central massif of the Black Hills Range and also of the surrounding grasslands and Badlands.

The main ranch headquarters lies along Rapid Creek just south of Highway 44 in Rapid Valley. Nearly one mile of Rapid Creek, the main east slope tributary to the Cheyenne and Missouri Rivers, runs through the property. The main creek channel and a nearby historic channel now utilized as a small lake chain offer a variety of scenic amenity and development sightings and ample space for golf courses and related community and recreational amenities. The valley area is comprised of about 700 acres of irrigated land currently utilized for forage production and seasonal livestock grazing. The terrain is generally level or rolling. and supports an abundance of wildlife. Wheaton College has maintained an ongoing wildlife study program on the ranch for many years. The concentration of diverse and rich ecosystems affords unique study options.

South of the valley floor area the land rises to form a low ridge characterized by plateaus and river breaks with a substantial view and scenic potential and also a potential upland golf course with a unique mountain backdrop. Further south the terrain decends into and across the Dry Creek Valley and plain. This area, in total, occupies about 1300 acres of valley plain and surrounding rolling uplands. Irrigation systems on the Dry Creek drainage supply about 400 acres of this area; water from the main valley could expand this resource.

The Harney Peak Ranch livestock headquarters is located in the center of this southern valley at the site of an historic breeding farm. The Western South Dakota region was a famous supply center for military horses for both European and American armies from the late Nineteenth Century until World War Two. Horses rather than cattle were the focus of many early day ranch outfits. The largest Russian Olive tree in the United States graces the southern headquarters.

The western component of the ranch consists primarily of level and rolling uplands lying east of the new Heartland expressway and overlooking it toward the Black Hills. The land directly adjacent to the Expressway is a level plain and valley with about one fourth mile of frontage on the expressway. Here again, the general topography shields the property from existing development and offers excellent mountain vistas.

Agricultural Operations

Currently, agricultural operations support in excess of 500 mother cows and about 200 head of feeder calves and replacement cattle and registered quarter horses with additional feed base available for about twice that number of breeding cattle. An interlocking system of stockwater pipelines, wells and dams support excellent pasture utilization.

Surplus feed base is currently utilized for resale of hay to the surrounding region. The primary focus of this endeavor is the Black Hills Hay Terminal warehouse at the main ranch headquarters; it is the only high-capacity weatherproof hay storage and distribution point in the region. Harney Peak Ranch hays and forage both won runner-up honors in recent South Dakota State University quality competition. While most available production is easily absorbed in the local region, specialty brokers and buyers have shipped the ranches hay as far as Florida and California. In general, the ranch has the best soil types available by virtue of its control of the fertile delta plains. Poorer soil types are predominate on the lands beyond the ranch property line.

Special Resources, Assets and Attributes

All of the Harney Peak Ranch property is currently carried under an agricultural tax base. This classification, along with owner-occupied dwellings, was granted a new twenty percent tax reduction over and above valuation in recognition of the importance of stability in the agriculture industry. This status and the associated agricultural revenues provide stable economic protection for staged development. Of course, South Dakota’s lack of personal and corporate income taxes is also helpful. These benefits are indicative of South Dakota’s aggressive legislative stance toward fiscal soundness, governmental efficiency and tax reform and reduction.

South Dakota and its communities have a strong commitment to fostering quality growth. There is probably only one property in the state of South Dakota that offers the size, location and setting to conveniently and securely manifest a master development. Kevin Costner’s Dunbar Resort project moved mountains, literally, both in complicated property exchanges and extensive terraforming to achieve an acceptable location. It also qualified for substantial state and local tax and financial incentives and cooperation of about seventeen million dollars to date. The same general level of inducement and community cooperation should be available for the development of the Harney Peak Ranch. The mountain moving, however, would not be required to develop this property.

Harney Peak Ranch currently holds the largest private ownership of first priority territorial water rights and also, as best as can be determined, the largest total irrigation water rights portfolio in the Rapid Creek watershed. These water rights have a substantial current economic value for direct irrigation purposes and an even greater value as a development asset. However, in light of the unavoidable growth the Black Hills will experience, the future value of this asset can hardly be estimated but could surpass the land itself.

Perhaps the most important new benefit to the Harney Peak Ranch came into being quite recently. The June 30, 1997 Rapid City Journal headline read "Support Pools for New Lake: Proposed recreational reservoir gains important state and federal backing". The one amenity lacking in Rapid City was a large lake. The proposed lake will be located just east of the Brennan Valley Ranch Unit. The protected basin of the Brennan Valley already possessed a unique combination of scenic landscape and mountain views just minutes from the city center. The southern portions of the ranch overlooking the basin will all be either lakefront or lake-view property. While the timeframe has not been set, this project will, when completed, create a valuable windfall in land values and aesthetics for the Harney Peak Ranch.

While not a specific financial asset, the Harney Peak Ranch’s history, traditions and ties to notable pioneer families and figures give a focus to the qualities that have drawn people to the Black Hills. The Madison and Lamb families were central figures in the authentic western history, with all its challenge and drama, of the Black Hills. All in all, it would be difficult to find a property that combines the best past, current and future elements in one comprehensive package.

Harney Peak Ranch Overview: Master Development Map and Information
Harney Peak Ranch Overview: Topographic Map and Information
Harney Peak Ranch Overview: Black Hills Area Map