CUSTER

city, seat (1875) of Custer county, southwestern South Dakota, U.S., in the southern Black Hills, on French Creek, 5,318 ft (1,621 m) above sea level. The town was laid out in 1875 after gold was discovered (1874) in French Creek by miners accompanying Gen. George A. Custer's reconnaissance expedition. Custer is the headquarters of the Black Hills National Forest. Nearby are the Custer State Park, Norbeck Wildlife Preserve, Mount Rushmore National Memorial, and Jewel Cave National Monument. Korczak Ziolkowski's Crazy Horse Memorial, an unfinished monumental statue of the Indian chief carved out of a mountain top, is 5 mi (8 km) north. Annual summer pageants depict the discovery of gold and a lynching in 1881. Custer has extensive mineral (gold, quartz, beryl, mica, gypsum) industries, lumbering, and livestock markets. Local museums display frontier and gold-mining memorabilia. Inc. 1883. Pop. (1990) 1,741.