{"id":322,"slug":"sica-hollow-state-park-sisseton-south-dakota","story":[{"heading":null,"paragraphs":["Sica Hollow means 'bad place' in Dakota — the wooded ravine in Sisseton where the springs run red, the park's own reservation site attributing the reddish bogs to the ancestral spirits of Sioux tradition. The Trail of the Spirits received National Recreation Trail status in 1971.","The file's documented spine is the name's honesty: a place called 'bad' by the people who knew it longest, the red springs being the feature the tradition explained — the water's color being the legend's ground."]},{"heading":"The red bogs","paragraphs":["The lore attributes the reddish bogs to ancestral spirits — the file's register being a Sioux tradition preserved by the tribe's own telling: the red water being the ancestors' mark, the hollow's 'badness' being its sacred weight.","The Trail of the Spirits is the file's signature — a path named for the tradition it walks, the hollow's springs being the site where the landscape's color and the people's legend meet."]},{"heading":"Why this file matters","paragraphs":["Sica Hollow is the archive's named-warning file — a 'bad place' by its own Dakota name, the red springs explained by ancestral spirits in the tribe's own tradition. The documented name and waters are the record; the spirits are the lore the people who named it kept.","A hollow called 'bad' by its first people keeps its spirits — the file's suggestion being that the red springs still run with what the Dakota saw in them."]}],"name":"Sica Hollow State Park","aliases":[],"type":"PARK","type_label":"Park","cats":["FOLKLORE","NATURAL_PHENOMENA"],"groups":["legends","nature"],"desc":"Park associated with documented cultural history.","full_desc":"Sica Hollow State Park is a park in Sisseton, South Dakota. Park associated with documented cultural history. Established in 1968; springs originate in groundwater. Trail of the Spirits received National Recreation Trail status in 1971. Local lore holds that The park’s reservation site attributes ancestral-spirit interpretations of reddish bogs to Sioux traditions.","address":"44950 Park Road","city":"Sisseton","county":null,"state":"South Dakota","postal":"57262","region":"Midwest","lat":45.662499,"lon":-97.045293,"coord_kind":"CITY","status":"NATURAL_SITE","access":"PUBLIC","access_notes":null,"ownership":null,"website":null,"phone":null,"year_built":null,"year_opened":null,"year_closed":null,"year_demolished":null,"designation":null,"current_use":null,"research_notes":"Traditions are attributed through a state agency; tribal-authored interpretation remains an enrichment priority. Do not equate all tribal beliefs or infer paranormal proof.","stage":"SOURCE_RESEARCH","quality":{"level":"MEDIUM","score":69.4,"dims":{"location_confidence":0.75,"identity_confidence":0.85,"historical_confidence":0.8,"source_quality":1,"paranormal_claim_provenance":0.8,"coordinate_confidence":0,"current_access_confidence":0.7,"freshness":0.65}},"claims":[{"id":244,"type":"CULTURAL_FOLKLORE","description":"The park’s reservation site attributes ancestral-spirit interpretations of reddish bogs to Sioux traditions. Open country keeps its stories differently — Sica Hollow State Park in Sisseton, South Dakota files its reports in weather and distance. 'Sica Hollow State Park facility details' preserves the telling; the record keeps it filed where it belongs, as lore. The legend does what legends do — it explains the place in a way the records can't.","evidence":"DOCUMENTED_LEGEND","evidence_label":"Documented legend","entity":null,"where":null,"first_report":null,"approx_date":null,"confidence":0.7,"conflict_notes":null,"source":{"name":"Sica Hollow State Park facility details","url":"https://reservations.gooutdoorssouthdakota.com/FacilityDetails.aspx?facID=60","publisher":"South Dakota Game Fish and Parks","type":"GOVERNMENT","authority":1},"conflicting_source":null,"variants":[]}],"history":[{"description":"Established in 1968; springs originate in groundwater. Trail of the Spirits received National Recreation Trail status in 1971. The landscape's recorded history gives the file real substance underneath the lore. The record holds it as fact — documented, not retold. 'Sica Hollow State Park' documents the entry. The record keeps it — history, not lore.","evidence":"HISTORICALLY_VERIFIED","date_start":null,"date_end":null,"confidence":null,"source":{"name":"Sica Hollow State Park","url":"https://gfp.sd.gov/parks/detail/sica-hollow-state-park/","publisher":"South Dakota Game Fish and Parks","type":"GOVERNMENT","authority":1}}],"legends":[{"name":null,"summary":"The park’s reservation site attributes ancestral-spirit interpretations of reddish bogs to Sioux traditions. The landscape at Sica Hollow State Park is the claim's whole setting: South Dakota wilderness with a name for the unexplained. 'Sica Hollow State Park facility details' preserves the telling; the record keeps it filed where it belongs, as lore. The account appears in 'Sica Hollow State Park facility details'. Legends accrue where records go silent; this one filled the gap and stayed.","earliest":null,"evidence":"DOCUMENTED_LEGEND","source":{"name":"Sica Hollow State Park facility details","url":"https://reservations.gooutdoorssouthdakota.com/FacilityDetails.aspx?facID=60","publisher":"South Dakota Game Fish and Parks","type":"GOVERNMENT","authority":1}}],"entities":[],"events":[],"investigations":[],"encounters":[],"media":[],"persons":[],"visitor":{"admission_fee":"Daily park admission: residents $10; nonresidents $15. Non-electric camping $16 per night; horse camp $18 per night.","operating_season":"Year round","last_verified_at":"2026-09-14T10:36:19+00:00","source":{"name":"Sica Hollow State Park","url":"https://gfp.sd.gov/parks/detail/sica-hollow-state-park/","publisher":"South Dakota Game Fish and Parks","type":"GOVERNMENT","authority":1}},"sources":[{"name":"Sica Hollow State Park facility details","url":"https://reservations.gooutdoorssouthdakota.com/FacilityDetails.aspx?facID=60","publisher":"South Dakota Game Fish and Parks","type":"GOVERNMENT","authority":1},{"name":"Sica Hollow State Park","url":"https://gfp.sd.gov/parks/detail/sica-hollow-state-park/","publisher":"South Dakota Game Fish and Parks","type":"GOVERNMENT","authority":1}],"conflicts":[],"wiki":{"title":"Sica Hollow State Park","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sica_Hollow_State_Park","desc":"State park in South Dakota, United States","extract":"Sica Hollow State Park (also Sieche Hollow State Park) is a  public recreation area located 15 miles northwest of Sisseton, South Dakota, United States. The state park was named Sica (pronounced shee-chah), a Dakota word for bad or evil, due to the iron-red tinted water which was seen as blood by the Dakota tribe in the area.\nIn 1967, Sica Hollow was designated as a National Natural Landmark by the National Park Service.","img":null,"score":104,"lat":45.7421,"lon":-97.24267},"counts":{"claims":1,"history":1,"legends":1,"entities":0,"sources":2}}