Home›Places›Savoy, SD›The Latchstring Inn
Historic place

The Latchstring Inn

10619 Roughlock Falls Rd, Savoy, SD

Named for the frontier custom of leaving a latchstring hanging out as a welcome sign, this canyon inn has operated since 1909 — even though the original building was torn down and rebuilt in 1989.

📅 1909–present🏛️ InnStill hereBuilt 1909
Open on the mapSlide back to 1909

The story

In 1906 Glen Inglis bought the log cabin that had been the office of the closed McLaughlin sawmill; in 1909 he and his wife Doris opened the Glendoris Inn, the canyon's first lodge. In 1919 new owners renamed it the Latchstring Inn, after the pioneer custom of leaving a door's latchstring out to signal visitors were welcome. The inn declined after the canyon railroad closed in 1934; by 1989, under Homestake ownership, the original buildings were judged beyond repair and demolished, with a new log building (today's Latchstring Restaurant and Spearfish Canyon Lodge) built on the site.

Everything that was here

Did you know?

The name comes from the frontier "latchstring out" custom for signaling hospitality.
Despite local lore, there was no fire — the original was demolished in 1989 due to structural decay.
The building standing today dates only to 1989, though the business traces to 1909.

Connected places

Homestake Hydroelectric Plant No. 2

Savoy, SD
Homestake

Nemo (Homestake timber camp)

Nemo, SD
Homestake

Dances With Wolves Winter Camp Site

Savoy, SD
Spearfish Canyon

Explore the full web of connections on the map.

Nearby history

Savoy (canyon hamlet)

Jct US-14A & Roughlock Falls Rd · 115 m away
This unincorporated speck of a resort hamlet began as a sawmill town supplying the Black Hills timber trade, and survive

Homestake Hydroelectric Plant No. 2

Spearfish Canyon (near Spearfish Falls) · 150 m away
This second Homestake power plant literally dried up one of Spearfish Canyon's named waterfalls for decades by diverting

Roughlock Falls

Roughlock Falls Rd, Little Spearfish Canyon · 975 m away
Wagon drivers once had to chain-lock their wheels to inch safely down the grade here — giving this roughly 50-foot casca

Dances With Wolves Winter Camp Site

Forest Service Road 222, Little Spearfish Canyon · 975 m away
In November 1989 a Lakota winter camp of real teepees was built in the snow north of Roughlock Falls for the closing sce

Cheyenne Crossing Stage Stop

21415 US Highway 14A · 7.9 km away
The last horse-change stop before the Cheyenne-to-Deadwood stagecoach made its final run into the gold camps is now a wo

Bridal Veil Falls

US Highway 14A (Bridal Veil Falls) · 8.2 km away
A 60-foot sheet of water cascading over limestone right beside the highway — Spearfish Canyon's most easily seen waterfa

Know something about The Latchstring Inn? An old photo, a date, a memory of what stood here before?

Add it on the map
Sourceshttps://www.sdpb.org/rural-life-and-history/history-of-the-glendoris-latchstring-inn