Only Sioux Falls has more people.
Rapid City is a center of education, health care, tourism, and trade for western South Dakota.
The chief industries in Rapid City make cement, computer parts, jewelry, meat products, and particle board. The South Dakota School of Mines and Technology is located there. Ellsworth Air Force Base lies nearby. Sioux Indians lived in the Black Hills before white settlers arrived there. Prospectors founded Rapid City in 1876, during the Black Hills gold rush.