Wall Drug – South Dakota
Have you ever wondered where the heck Wall Drug in South Dakota is? Maybe you’ve been there? Or maybe you’ve seen the Wall Drug Signs all over the world. Our travels with Buffalo Billfold Company often take us all over the USA as we sell our leather goods at art fairs. We often head through Wyoming via I-90 since that takes us through South Dakota. If you ever visit South Dakota, make sure to visit the Badlands, Mt Rushmore, and of course, check out Wall Drug Store on Main Street in Wall, SD. We also saw the Wall Drug Cafe and the Wall Drug Dinosaur. We did this when we had our kids along back in the 1990’s. We were on our way to the Bighorn National Forest in Wyoming, and the Drug Store was a great location to get out and stretch our legs on this road trip.
Historic Wall Drug Store
We’re always on the lookout for fun places to partner with to sell our leather goods so we decided to checkout the Historic Wall Drug Store. You can find EVERYTHING in that place. We decided that this would be a fun place to sell our leather goods and connected with management. Among many other fun items, you’ll now find our American Buffalo Leather Goods! We of course had a coffee and some snacks at the Wall Drug Cafe and then went on to check out the Wall Drug Dinosaur.
Wall Drug Dinosaur
The Wall Drug Dinosaur was built in the 1960’s by Emmet Sullivan. It’s a giant concrete dinosaur whose purpose was to attract customers back to the town when Interstate 90 was constructed and bypassed the town. Sometime us small town businesses need to do big things to attract the attention back to our small businesses! This green dinosaur is huge and even has eyes that light up. A pretty ingenious way to grab the eyes of passing tourists!
Wall Drug Signs
What we all know Wall Drug for the most is the signs. Wall Drug Signs can be found all over the world and are an attraction of their own. It all started when Dorothy Hustead created a sign to put on route 16 to draw visitors to the store. They went on to have signs even in the London Underground telling onlookers how far away Wall Drug was.
A Game to Play with Kids
When our son took his family out to visit us in the Bighorn National Forest in 2018 they decided to make a stop at Wall too. With three kids in tow, they decided to play a game once they got to the Wall Drug Store. They decided to work together to find the most interesting, or ridiculous, Bison object they could find. As they worked their way through the store, they found all sorts of, “super cool toys” and things that elicited the response, “what’s that weird thing over there?” After a couple, “I have to have this dad,” moments, they came away with this treasure.
Best find: Bison Head Toy Car with Quad Exhaust
Yep. You heard right. Someone makes this ridiculous toy car. It’s got a Bison head, quad exhaust, and when you push it, it continues propelling itself forward for a while. They weren’t sure what they were going to find when they started looking, but they were pretty sure they weren’t going to find this car. Of course, the kids loved it. Who comes up with this wacky stuff?! Maybe… … … maybe this will be the next make/model of our RV? ;P If you decide to make a trip through South Dakota, make sure to check out this fun destination and all of the other fun places along the way!
