Corsica, SD

Corsica is a Douglas County city in south-central South Dakota, with 561 residents in the 2020 census. The town took shape in August 1905 when the railroad reached this part of the prairie. Railroad workers from the French island of Corsica supplied the name; Napoleon and Little Napoleon were also considered. By 1907 the city had a water system, fire department, and a busy group of businesses, and electricity arrived in 1919. The tracks are gone now, but the town’s straight streets and farm-country connections still carry that railroad beginning.

Schooling has always been part of Corsica’s center. The first classes met in the back rooms of Corsica State Bank in 1905 before moving to the Baptist church, and a school building opened the next year. Corsica and Stickney consolidated in 2015–16 as the Corsica-Stickney School District 21-3. Today the city park, pool, school, volunteer organizations, and grain-country roads keep the same small-town map working. Corsica is a South Dakota place named by railroad workers, built around a school and depot-era grid, and still connected to the surrounding prairie.