How Canton, South Dakota Got Its Name (China, or Ohio?)

Canton, South Dakota, got its name from a settlers’ vote, and the most famous story says they picked Canton, China, believing it was on the exact opposite side of the globe. That idea was wrong, and there’s an older written source that says the name came from somewhere much closer: Canton, Ohio.

The story everyone tells: China

A state historical marker on the courthouse square says the county seat “was named Canton by vote of settlers,” who believed it lay exactly opposite Canton, China. The U.S. Geological Survey’s record, drawing on an older South Dakota reference, says the settlers couldn’t make up their minds about a name and chose Canton because it was “the city closest to being the most opposite on the globe to where they were situated.”

In other words, the idea was that if you dug straight down through the earth from here, you’d come out in China. Canton is the old English name for the city now called Guangzhou.

Were they right?

Not even close, and you can check it yourself. Take Canton’s latitude and longitude, flip them to the other side of the planet, and you land in the southern Indian Ocean, far to the southwest of Australia. The real Canton, China, is north of the equator, so it could never have been right under a town in South Dakota.

The other version: Ohio

A 1908 railroad guide to place names tells it differently. In its entry for Lincoln County, it says the county seat, Canton, was “named from Canton, Ohio, that was named indirectly from the Chinese city.” So in that version, China is still in the background, but only because the Ohio city borrowed the name first.

The guide doesn’t mention a vote or the opposite-side-of-the-globe idea, and the marker and the USGS record don’t mention Ohio. We don’t have a source from the 1860s to settle it, so we’re giving you both. The China story is the one on the state marker.

Before it was Canton

The marker says the place first showed up on maps in 1866 as Commerce City. The USGS record says the town was settled in 1867 and platted in 1868.

Sources & further reading

• Canton historical marker, South Dakota State Historical Society (1955). The settlers’ vote and the belief that the town lay opposite Canton, China, plus the 1866 “Commerce City.” Read through the Historical Marker Database listing.
• GNIS feature 1254228 (U.S. Geological Survey). The federal record for Canton. Cites an older South Dakota reference on the indecision and the “most opposite” city; gives 1867 for settlement, 1868 for the platting and 1881 for incorporation.
• W. H. Stennett, A History of the Origin of the Place Names Connected with the Chicago & North Western and Chicago, St. Paul, Minneapolis & Omaha Railways (1908). A public-domain railroad guide. Its Lincoln County entry says the name came from Canton, Ohio.