The "Dakota boom" is a label historians have almost universally adopted to describe the period of settlement in Dakota Territory between the years 1878 and 1887. The term "boom" has been applied to this period largely because of the volume of land claimed and the rapid increase in Dakota Territory's population that occurred during those years. Most accounts of this time period have treated the Dakota boom as a rural phenomenon, and certainly its main manifestation was the rapid claiming of land by immigrant and American would-be farm owners in the plains of Dakota Territory and adjacent areas. Less well known is the impact this rapid, large-scale settling of the land had on the rise and growth of town sites aspiring to become prosperous cities. This essay is a case study examining the evolution of a specific Plains town site, Sioux Falls, Dakota Territory, into a prosperous town when it experienced a rapid infusion of population as a result of the Dakota boom.