Things to Do in Lead SD This Winter: Main Street Holiday Guide
October 29, 2026
October 29, 2026
The newest thing on Main Street in Lead is a concrete retaining wall that now looks like it's moving. David Livingston, a local artist, painted a Black Hills wildlife scene on it that is about 70 feet long and 10 feet high. Residents J.C. and Beverly Webber commissioned it because they live across the street and had spent years looking at mismatched gray concrete from their dining room. The Black Hills Pioneer reported on Oct. 21 that Livingston had just finished the mural that Sunday. In the same story he said he started painting murals in Lead because "we need something to catch people's peripherals." He wanted to slow people down and get them to stop for a bite and look around.
That idea fits the next two months well. Terry Peak says it typically opens limited terrain in late November or early December, depending on weather and temperatures. Meanwhile, Lead's winter season is already on the calendar a few blocks away. The Homestake Opera House at 313 W. Main St., the Phoebe Apperson Hearst Library next door at 315 W. Main St., and the Sanford Lab Homestake Visitor Center at 160 W. Main St. have something scheduled almost every week from now until Christmas.
The stretch from Oct. 29 to Nov. 7 is the busiest on the calendar, with a winter-weather talk in the middle of it.
Thursday, Oct. 29. The South Dakota Poetry Society brings "Poetry on the Road" to the Homestake Opera House from 6 to 8 p.m. It includes free readings, an open mic and South Dakota Poet Laureate Bruce Roseland.
Saturday, Oct. 31. Sanford Underground Research Facility hosts the Lead Community Trunk or Treat and Dark Matter Day at the Visitor Center from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. The trunk-or-treat runs alongside hands-on Dark Matter Day activities. Halloween is also the last day of Terry Peak's October season-pass sale, which brings up the ski hill again.
After the sale ends, Terry Peak's adult pass goes up by $322 and the junior pass by $182, before tax:
| Season pass | October sale price | Price after Nov. 1 |
|---|---|---|
| Adult | $478 plus $27.25 tax | $800 plus $45.60 tax |
| Junior | $293 plus $16.70 tax | $475 plus $27.08 tax |
The Terry Peak season pass page says sale prices are available online through Oct. 31, 2026. In-person and phone sales run on weekdays through the end of the month, so the last weekday is Friday, Oct. 30.
Thursday, Nov. 5. November's Deep Talks at the Visitor Center is about the coming winter. Dr. Darren Clabo, South Dakota's state fire meteorologist and an associate professor of practice at South Dakota Mines, will talk about what Sanford Lab's listing calls the 2026–2027 "Godzilla" El Niño. He'll cover how scientists measure it, how current conditions compare with history, and what a possibly record-breaking El Niño could mean for winter in South Dakota and across the country. A social hour with light refreshments starts at 5 p.m., and the talk begins at 6 p.m. If you can't make it, the event page will livestream it starting at 6 p.m. Mountain.
Friday, Nov. 6. The Opera House hosts a free Songwriters Showcase at 5:30 p.m., with local musicians playing new songs.
Saturday, Nov. 7. The Lead Deadwood Arts Center holds its 34th annual Cheesecake Sampler & Battle of the Hors D'oeuvres at the Opera House from 5 to 8 p.m. The Chamber listing gives tickets as $25.
That's five events in ten days, all on the same street.
The second weekend of November is when the town's two kinds of Main Street draws overlap.
The Mile High Market is Lead's second-Saturday event. The Lead Area Chamber's listing describes it as arts and crafts from local makers, guided historic tours, shopping and food from local eateries. Open containers are allowed in designated areas along Main Street. The November market is Saturday, Nov. 14, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. If you make things and want to sell them, the listing says to rent a table through Gnarly Pine Makerspace at [email protected].
That evening, the Opera House holds A Dickens Christmas Festival of Trees at 5 p.m. A preview night is Friday, Nov. 13, at 4 p.m. The Festival of Trees page lists entry at $10, with tickets at the door, and encourages guests to bring a donation for the Boys & Girls Club or the Twin City Animal Shelter. Put together, Nov. 14 runs from a morning walk past the makers' tables to an evening of decorated trees at the Opera House. Everything happens within walking distance, and there's room in the afternoon to stop for a pastry.
For the pastry, the Pioneer reported that Asia's Buttercream Dreams at 403 W. Main St. sells baked treats, custom cakes, dirty sodas and ice cream. Its listed hours are 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sunday. Check before you go, since small-shop hours change with the season.
The Sanford Lab events calendar also lists Ask a Scientist sessions with Gavin Cox and Alex Geffre and a John Bahcall Colloquium on the LZ dark matter experiment this November and December, so check the calendar for exact times. There's a lot to ask about this fall. In September, the LZ experiment reported one unusual interaction that could fit a dark matter signal. SURF was careful to say it was not a discovery. The analysis came in at 2.6 sigma, which is below the threshold physicists use to claim one. In July, the lab also announced NEMESIS, a new underground experiment that studies the background radiation sensitive physics experiments have to screen out.
After Thanksgiving, the season spreads beyond the Opera House doors and down the hill toward Deadwood.
Terry Peak says it usually expands to seven days a week just before Christmas, so the Big Band and "A Christmas Carol" fall around the time the mountain's season typically picks up.
Some things on Main Street don't have a date because they happen every week. The Hearst Library at 315 W. Main St. holds Preschool Story Time on Wednesdays at 11:15 a.m. and a Homeschool Hangout on Wednesday afternoons from 2 to 4 p.m. On days with nothing at the Opera House, a story time and a slow walk past Livingston's wall make a good short outing.
Times and prices for community events can change on short notice, so check each venue's page before you go.
I work out of Spearfish, but Lead's Main Street is one of my favorite places in the Northern Black Hills once the weather turns cold. If you're thinking about a home within walking distance of the Opera House, or a place with room for skis and a view of Terry Peak, I'm glad to walk Main Street with you on a market Saturday and talk it through. Cher Rhoades can help when you're ready to Work with Cher.
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