The Adams Museum, opened in 1930 and the oldest history museum in the Black Hills, is the best single introduction to Deadwood's gold-rush past. Three floors of exhibits cover the original 1876 stampede, the lives of Hickok and Calamity Jane, the Chinese community that once made up a quarter of the town, and the engineering of the Homestake Mine.
Highlights include a plaster cast of the Thoen Stone — the 1834 carved sandstone slab on which a doomed prospector recorded the deaths of his companions — Potato Creek Johnny's gold nugget, and an extensive collection of Lakota and Northern Plains artefacts. Entry is by donation and an hour is enough for a thorough visit.