Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 18.djvu/427

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SOUTH CAROLINA COLLEGE.
371
SOUTH DAKOTA.

was closed in 1863 and was reopened in 1866 as the University of South Carolina. In 1878 the university was divided into two branches; one the South Carolina College, the other Claflin College, for negroes, at Orangeburg. Its charter was again amended in 1887 and 1890, and in 1894 women were admitted to all courses. It has a system of accredited schools, the certificate of which admits students without examination. The college has a department of law. In 1902 the students numbered 215, with a faculty of 18. The library contained 33,783 volumes. Its income was $35,454.

SOUTH CAROLINA INTER-STATE AND WEST INDIAN EXPOSITION. An exposition held in Charleston, South Carolina, from December 1, 1901, to June 2, 1902. The site chosen covered an area of about 250 acres. The principal buildings were: Administration, Agriculture, Art, Auditorium, Commerce, Cotton Palace, Fisheries, Machinery, Mines and Forestry, Negro, Transportation, and Women's. The larger buildings were constructed in the Spanish Renaissance style of architecture, and were finished in staff, coated with a dull white tint that gave the name of Ivory City to the grounds. There were also State buildings erected by Illinois, Maryland, Missouri, New York, and Pennsylvania, city buildings representing Cincinnati and Philadelphia, and special structures devoted to the exhibits of Cuba, Porto Rico, and Guatemala. The grounds were adorned with statuary, among them six original historical groups, situated in the Court of Palaces, and including “The Aztec,” by Louis A. Gudebrod; “The Negro,” by Charles A. Lopez; and “The Huguenot,” by Miss Elsie Ward. The total attendance was 674,086; the cost of the exposition was $1,250,000, while the receipts were $313,000.

SOUTH′COTT, Joanna (1750-1814). A religious visionary, born at Gittisham, in Devonshire, England, of humble parentage. In youth she was a domestic servant, chiefly in Exeter. In 1792 she declared herself to be the woman driven into the wilderness, the subject of the prophecy in Rev. xii., and began to claim the gift of prophecy. She gave forth predictions in prose and verse, and, although very illiterate, wrote numerous letters and pamphlets. When over sixty years of age she imagined that she was destined to give birth miraculously to a second Shiloh or prince of peace. Her writings include The Strange Effects of Faith (1801), with continuations (1802-20); books of Prophecies and Visions (1803); Letters (1804); The True Explanation of the Bible (1804-10); the Book of Wonders (1813-14). Consult her Memoirs (London, 1814).

SOUTH DAKO′TA. Popularly called the ‘Coyote State.’ A north central State of the United States, lying on either side of the middle Missouri, between latitudes 42° 28′ and 45° 57′ north and between longitudes 90° 26′ and 104° 3′ west. It is bounded on the north by North Dakota, on the east by Minnesota and Iowa, on the south by Nebraska, and on the west by Wyoming and Montana. With the exception of an irregular salient angle in the southeast between the Missouri and Big Sioux Rivers, and a reëntering angle in the northeast formed by Lakes Bigstone and Traverse, the boundaries of the State are straight lines running along meridians and parallels, and forming a rectangle 200 miles wide and 380 miles long. The area is 77,650 square miles, of which 76,850 square miles, or 49,184,000 acres, are land surface. South Dakota ranks twelfth in size among the States.

Topography. The State lies within the region of the Great Plains, and, broadly considered, consists of a rolling upland plain sloping gradually from an altitude of 3500 feet in the west to about 1400 feet in the southeast. The entire State lies above 1000 feet, with the exception of a very narrow belt along the shores of Lakes Bigstone and Traverse in the extreme northeastern corner. The eastern half is smooth, with the broad, gently sloping valley of the James River traversing it from north to south. In the western half denudation by running water has been very active compared with atmospheric erosion, so that numerous buttes and ridges remain to show the former level of the plateau. In the southwestern part the effect of denudation is especially shown in the remarkable region known as the Bad Lands. They consist of a labyrinth of deep ravines, steep hills, and precipitous bluffs of white clay carved out by rapid erosion, and are in parts almost destitute of vegetation. The most prominent diversifying feature of the State, however, is the elliptical, dome-like uplift of the Black Hills, rising near the western boundary between the two forks of the Cheyenne River, and covering about 5000 square miles. The highest point is Harney Peak, with an altitude of 7216 feet.

Hydrography. The Missouri River traverses the State in a winding course from the middle of the northern boundary to the southeastern corner, forming for some distance a part of the southern boundary. Its valley is comparatively narrow, and rises in terraces (which are more abrupt on the eastern bank) to the general level of the plain, which lies 200 to 300 feet above the stream. The western tributaries, chief of which are the Grand, Moreau, Big Cheyenne, and White Rivers, flow nearly due east in similar narrow terraced valleys. On the other hand, the two eastern tributaries, the James and the Big Sioux, flow southward parallel with the main stream, and their valleys are broad and gently sloping. In the eastern half of the State there are numerous glacial lakes, none of which, however, are of great size except the above mentioned Lakes Bigstone and Traverse on the northeastern boundary.

Climate, Soil, and Vegetation. South Dakota, occupying almost the very centre of the continent, has, of course, a continental climate with great extremes of temperature. The mean annual temperature is 44.3° F. The mean for January is 15° and for July 72.2°, while the absolute extremes may rise to more than 115° above or fall to more than 40° below zero. But the heat of summer and the cold of winter are much more endurable than the more moderate temperatures of the Eastern States, owing to the dryness of the atmosphere, which renders the climate bracing and pleasant. The winter is often tempered by the dry and warm chinooks, but occasionally, though fortunately not often, the State is visited by blizzards—severe northern gales laden with fine floating snow. The snowfall is less than that of New York or New England. The average annual rainfall for the State is 20 inches, being 30 to 40 inches in the eastern third, 20 to 30 inches in