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“When I approached Rollie Dolly, then special aide to SD Governor George Mikkelsen, about putting wild horses on SD soils, he talked with the Governor, then called the Bureau of Land Management in Washington DC, about a possible program in SD. Their first response was less than promising. We continued to provide the BLM with information about our ideas in getting something going to aide the plight of the wild horse population. After numerous calls and memos, Rollie rec'd his first positive call. The federal government said "there is a person in Oregon, who is a respected conservationist, who is a rancher and is listened to by the agricultural community, and we will work with him. He is looking at doing something in Kansas, but if you want, we will point him to South Dakota for a look see. His name is Dayton O. Hyde
Weeks later, on a Sunday evening, we met this long drink of water at the Rapid City airport. We traveled to a motel, met until late in the evening and shared ideas and a listened to Dayton tell stories as only he can do. The next day, we put Dayton and a BLM administrator into a helicopter and headed to Hell's Canyon in the beautiful southern Black Hills. The weather cooperated as we traveled to one of the most unique pieces of real estate in the world, We landed below the eastern face of Flint Hill, a very
significant location to the native American Indians. The grass was tall, the
trees green, and even those of us, who had been there before,
were amazed how it looked through Dayton's eyes. He
verbalized our feelings, "This place will be a fine
home for wild horses". ”
–Randall Wright, Black Hills
Wild Horse Sanctuary board
member and South Dakota
real estate Broker