Welcome to De Smet, South Dakota. This tiny town has a famous past. A celebrity author lived here—Laura Ingalls Wilder. 

Of course, she wasn’t so famous at the time. She was still a girl. 

De Smet is an example of a town taking excellent care of itself. The town has raised more than $15 million for medical, cultural, and beautification projects locally. About 1,100 people live in De Smet. But the town keeps growing. People make plans to build new homes. 

“The passion people feel here is really remarkable,” says Rita Anderson. She helped raise money for the town. “There’s always been a feeling in De Smet that if you’re going to do anything, you’re going to go over the top and make it better than any other community around.” 

The Beautiful De Smet Committee formed to remake downtown. The members want it to be a place locals and tourists gather. They built a welcome arch over Main Street. Travelers can see it from the highway. Downtown De Smet now has hanging flower baskets and a sculpture trail showing characters from Mrs. Wilder’s books.  

Next project? A system of trails from downtown to Big Slough and Silver Lake. (Places you’ll recognize if you’ve read the Little House books.) 

Making a town beautiful takes hard work and money. For De Smet, much of the funding needed came from a man named Greg Carmon. 

Mr. Carmon is 72. He grew up on his family’s farm outside De Smet. Eventually, he left town and grew a successful business called Midwest Railcar Repair. He loves his hometown. He says the people of De Smet are “always thinking outside the box.”  

Here’s the next “outside the box” idea coming out of De Smet. People are lobbying lawmakers to preserve a large area of town as the Laura Ingalls Wilder State Park.  

Why? This world, as it is now, is not our home. But we can use our money and time to make it beautiful for others.