SOUTH DAKOTA – In TURGEON v. CITY OF SPEARFISH, 2026 S.D. 22, handed down today, April 9, the South Dakota Supreme Court addressed a dispute concerning a road across a City Park and rendered a decision which favored neighboring landowners, Leslie and Karen Turgeon.  The Turgeons claim they need access across the Thoen Stone Monument property owned by City of Spearfish.  This property is operated as a City Park. Turgeons claim that the road on this park property provides their only access to their real estate.  In response to the City’s utilization of a locked gate across the roadway, they filed suit for a Declaratory Judgment that the park road was a road which had been dedicated to the public.  They relied, inter alia, on a plat which was recorded in 2012 which stated that the road was dedicated to the public.  The trial court, Honorable Michelle K. Comer, granted summary judgment for the City of Spearfish, holding that the 2012 plat language had never been officially accepted by the City. The trial court rejected Turgeons’ arguments that the City had expressly accepted the dedication and, alternatively, that the City had implicitly acknowledged and accepted the dedication.  

The SD Supreme Court reversed the trial court and remanded for a more thorough review on the issue of implied acceptance, stating in ¶40: 

However, in determining whether there was an implied acceptance of the dedication, the circuit court failed to consider logical inferences from the facts and the court inappropriately weighed the competing evidence regarding this issue. We, therefore, reverse the circuit court’s decision granting the City’s motion for summary judgment and remand the case for trial on the question of whether there was an implied acceptance of the 2012 dedication by the City. 

This decision by the high court is unanimous (5-0), with opinion authored by Retired Justice Kern.

The Court’s opinion provides information about this historical monument, as follows: 

In ¶3 of the opinion: “The Thoen Stone was discovered on Lookout Mountain in 1887. It recounts the story of gold prospectors who traveled to the Black Hills in search of gold in 1834, forty years before the Black Hills Gold Rush. A replica of the Thoen Stone, the Thoen Stone Monument, now sits at the end of St. Joe Street in Spearfish and is accessible via the Road.”

And in footnote 1: “Although not contained in the record, the following information is of significant historical interest. The stone slab, dated 1834, recounts the story of Ezra Kind and his companions who traveled to the Black Hills in search of gold. The marker calls into question the date of the first discovery of gold in the Black Hills, which was previously thought to be 1874 after the Custer Expedition and the subsequent gold rush. The stone, which was buried several feet below the surface, was discovered in 1887 by Louis Thoen on Lookout Mountain in Spearfish. The original stone is located in the Adams Museum and House in Deadwood. The replica sits above Spearfish at the end of the Thoen Stone Road east of town.”

The Turgeons are represented by attorney Nathan Chicoine of Rapid City.  The City of Spearfish is represented by attorneys Richard M. Willams and Aidan F. Goetziner of Rapid City.A copy of the Supreme Court’s decision may be obtained by sending an e-mail to rogermbaron@gmail.com .