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When traveling down to Sioux Falls to play Augustana College in a club soccer match, some of my teammates and I traveled through downtown and stumbed upon a pair of gates that lead us to a park of the falls.

People have been attracted to the powerful "Soues Falls" of Sioux Falls, SD for over 2500 years. Europeans first made documentation of the place in August of 1804 when Lewis and Clark describe the falls. Over 14000 years ago, the pinkish stone was exposed when the last glacier redirected the flow of the water to the current river valley. The stone was created by an ancient, shallow sea and slowly deposited to the bottom of the sea and became quartzite bedrock.The ripping flow of the water over the beautiful pink rock is a landmark that many are amazed by. The site has an aura about it. It is a very inspirational place, but the power and flow of the water was seen by many as a money maker. When land in Minnesota and Iowa began to be speculated and sold the Dakota Land Company and Western Town Company decided to buy up land in the river valley, with such a source of water power, the site was a perfect place to make a profit and a city.

The city of Sioux Falls started with a building made of sod. "Fort Sod" was built buy the two land companies to protect their new investment from the natives. The site is now filled with scars of history. Buildings soon went from temporary sod buildings to massive buildings made of the pink stone. Ruins of buildings and old footing now lay scattered around the site as sculptures of the past. The falls is a lively place where many people gather to owe at its beauty. I observed many tourist as well as two separate wedding parties. Places that are graced with names on the prairie are places with topography change, have an abundance of water, or some other unique feature. Sioux Falls has been an attraction for thousands of years as long as the waterfalls people will gather.