Monday,  July 9, 2012 • Vol. 12--No. 361 • 14 of 25 •  Other Editions

SD Capitol Rotunda floor gets reinforced

• PIERRE, S.D. (AP) -- Work will begin soon to provide extra support for a floor in the South Dakota Capitol that features glass cubes.
• KGFX Radio reports (http://bit.ly/LU4Rgq ) that the work should be completed in early October.
• The floor is a combination of tile and panels of concrete inset with glass prism cubes that allow light to pass between the Capitol's first floor and the second-floor rotunda.
• State Bureau of Administration Commissioner Paul Kinsman says the work on

the 100-year-old Capitol will make sure the floor remains sound for another century.
• Kinsman says when the Capitol was built, the concrete in the panels was not reinforced with steel as is done in modern construction. He says thin steel pieces are being added under the concrete panels and support beams to strengthen the floor.
•

Site of future Blood Run state park draws visitors
DIRK LAMMERS,Associated Press

• SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) -- Blood Run, a national historic landmark set to become South Dakota's first new state park in more than 50 years, is already drawing some 20 cars a day.
• The picturesque acreage along the Big Sioux River bordering Iowa was used by thousands of Oneota Indians into the early 1700s, and its diverse landscape boasts a large oak forest, rolling hills, flood plains and riverside bluffs.
• Visitors can traverse two miles of mowed trails on their own, but Eric Vander Stouwe, who supervises the Blood Run property and nearby Newton Hills State Park, suggested taking a tour led by historian Edward Raventon. The tours provide information about Blood Run's historically rich burial mounds, refuse pits and artifacts.
• "We started with 12 people for guided hikes every Saturday morning, but the interest was so high that we doubled it," Vander Stouwe said.
• Park officials are developing a brochure for self-guided tours that should be available online within weeks, he added.
• The Oneota culture wasn't a single tribe but conglomerate of groups with similar characteristics dating back to 1200 or earlier. The Oneota grew corn and other staples, hunted bison, made pottery, built circular lodges and stored perishable food underground in bell-shaped storage pits lined with grass and covered with logs or bison hides.

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