Nicknames: “Peace Garden State” and “Heaven on Earth” • Motto: “Liberty and Union, Now and Forever, One and Inseparable”
Named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux Native American tribes. South Dakota became a state same time North Dakota. So it is either the 39th or the 40th state.
President Benjamin Harrison shuffled the statehood papers before signing them so that no one could tell which became a state first. Alphabetical listing makes it the 39th state.