View from east, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
I recently stayed at the former Blue Cloud Abbey, now privately-owned as Abbey of the Hills Inn and Retreat Center outside Marvin, Grant County. It’s located a short way off I-29 on the coteau looking towards Milbank in the east.
It was an experiment, to see what it was all about, and it was partly inspired by my visit in June to St. John’s Abbey in Minnesota–I wanted to see what our state’s Modernist abbey was like. I’d had a brief idea about the place from photos I’d seen, stories from friends, and a brief ‘just curious’ bit of research into the architect. It’s a far more special, tactile experience to explore while you’re living at the place, even for a short time. The abbey is expansive, almost entirely stone or stone clad. The stone on the exterior and in the church is warm and glowing and intricate. The guide of an evening history tour, on which I tagged along, thought it was limestone transported from Indiana (where their archabbey was). Then, I loved stumbling on the smaller details in the clean lines of the side altars, the red stone on the altar steps, the mid-century recessed lights, and the bubble glass in the side doors of the sanctuary that all filled out and rounded out the design. The stained glass in the sanctuary played with the light in beautiful ways. The use of a lot of green tile through the interior and the few rooms with a lot of dark, wood paneling took getting used to, but other interior features were delightful, like the molded tile in the dining room and the variety of linoleum and mosaic flooring.
The Blue Cloud Abbey was founded in the 1940s to provide support for Catholic missions to the Sioux reservations in the Dakotas. The abbey was founded by the Order of St. Benedict under the Archabbey at St. Meinrad, Indiana. It was named for Blue Cloud – Mahpiyato, an Ihanktonwan Sioux leader who supported the Church’s work. The monks worked on the missions, at area churches, studied in four rooms of library materials, quilted, ran a farm, built a greenhouse, made bread, and demonstrated hospitality by welcoming retreat-goers of many faiths. The abbey had also included a great collection of material culture and photographs at their American Indian Culture Research Center. When the abbey closed, the collection was deposited with the Center for Western Studies in Sioux Falls, who are working on digitizing part of the collection.
The Abbey of the Hills has posted a bit on the sites’ history on their website here. (Check the tabs for ‘About: Our Story’ and ‘Explore: Tour’).
Some additional history on the architect, Edo Belli, out of Chicago, from the Art Institute of Chicago: summary, oral history interview.
And now, a selection of my photos from the trip…
Exterior detail, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
Steeple, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
View of the abbey from the southeast, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
Sanctuary, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
New altar, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
View from altar, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
North side stained glass, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
Side altar, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
Reflection of light in transept window of St. Scholastica, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
Reflection of stained glass across a side altar, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
Bubble glass in doors, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
Dining room with cool molded X-pattern tiles, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
Fireplace design, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
Lower hallway, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
And if nothing else, it’s hard to beat that view when you wake up in the morning…
View to the southeast over the Lower Lake, Blue Cloud Abbey, Marvin SD, July 2015, photograph by author.
[June 2021]
While working on additional research into the abbey’s architecture, I came across information about court cases and lobbying work that has been undertaken in the last ten years by native people who have stories of physical and sexual abuse from their time at St. Paul’s school at Marty in the 1970s (I have also written about its history and architecture), while it was under the administration of Blue Cloud Abbey. I wasn’t aware of these stories until now, and share them here to acknowledge that history also contains violence, trauma, and pain.
Yet, I have also learned about new aspects of abbey history about which there is much to commend–Yardy’s thesis, which acknowledges the accusations of abuse, is focused on the publication Blue Cloud Quarterly, under the editorship of Brother Benet Tvedten OSB and issued from 1968 to 1988, that was a path-breaking small press for contemporary American Indian poetry.
- Bernie et al. v. Blue Cloud Abbey, law.justia.com
- “Child Sexual Abuse: Time to Right a Wrong,” Lakota Times, February 4, 2021.
- Bethany A. Yardy, “’A Labor of Love’: A Social and Literary History of the Blue Cloud Quarterly.” M.A. Thesis, University of Texas-Arlington, December 2014. https://rc.library.uta.edu/uta-ir/bitstream/handle/10106/24982/Yardy_uta_2502M_12982.pdf?sequence=1.
History in South Dakota 
Interesting piece and very pretty photos! Especially the stained glass and the last landscape.
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I recently became friends with Father Denis at the Archabbey at Saint Meinrad. He was the abbot
At Blue Cloud and I wanted to see where had been. THank you very much.
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I just read a story about the stone used to clad the Blue Cloud Abbey. It’s not limestone, but sandstone. The monks at St. Meinrad had a sandstone quarry on their grounds in St. Meinrad, Indiana and transported all the stone by truck to South Dakota when they built the Blue Cloud Abbey. This particular sandstone has beautiful mottled swirls of orange, red, white, tan, and brown, and it is found on many buildings built in the 1940s-1960s across southern Indiana.
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Very cool trip and photography. I’m from SD but have never been. Planning a trip next time I’m back home.
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Thank you for posting this history and the beautiful photographs. I remember going to Blue Cloud Abby, about 10 years old through my middle school years. My Father was the Chaplain at the VA Medical Center, who was a Disciples of Christ Minister. It wasn’t often that a family of five were invited to dinner let alone get to attend a retreat center. It was so beautiful and the people on staff so kind. It is true that though the Abby was hosted by Catholic backgrounded staff, they included all faiths though. And they tried to share about Native religious beliefs occasionally.
What I remember the most was the big Saint Bernard dog, who was sort of the mascot for the center. He liked to eat the leftovers from dinner and to play out by the lake. Really sweet and for SD an unusual breed at that time.
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I am an alumnus of Saint Meinrad College, which was run by Saint Meinrad Archabbey. I can see lots of influences from Saint Meinrad in Blue Cloud Abbey, including in the Indiana sandstone. One of my close friends who recently passed, Terry Wick, was from Sioux Falls originally. He frequently visited Blue Cloud Abbey in his younger days, assisting in the kitchen and elsewhere.
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