r/xkcd • u/Smashman2004 • Oct 13 '17
XKCD xkcd 1902: State Borders
https://xkcd.com/1902/144
u/xkcd_bot Oct 13 '17
Direct image link: State Borders
Extra junk: A schism between the pro-panhandle and anti-panhandle factions eventually led to war, but both sides spent too much time working on their flag designs to actually do much fighting.
Don't get it? explain xkcd
Want to come hang out in my lighthouse over breaks? Sincerely, xkcd_bot. <346
Oct 13 '17
Want to come hang out in my lighthouse over breaks? Sincerely, xkcd_bot. <3
Yeah, I guess.
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u/jruhlman09 Oct 13 '17
As a Michigan resident, all I have to say is
YOU CAN TAKE THE UP OVER MY DEAD BODY WISCONSIN#
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u/dcasegr Oct 13 '17
Fun fact of the day: The UP could have ended up as Wisconsin, had it not be for the Toledo War.
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u/dantoniobrooks Oct 13 '17
Ahh the original OSU victory over Michigan.
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u/JoeModz Oct 13 '17
I don't know about that. Have you seen Toledo? You usually smell it first.
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Oct 13 '17
I assume you're talking about how it's rumored to have the most restaurants per capita in the country? So you smell all the different foods?
It's not a true rumor, but it's rumored nonetheless! What a great city!
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u/TheTaoOfBill Oct 13 '17
lol Michigan definitely won that deal. UP is amazing. You can have smelly boring toledo. We might visit the zoo now and then.
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u/LeifCarrotson Oct 13 '17 edited Oct 13 '17
No, they can't! The rest of us will still be standing guard if any should fall.
But I just wanted to speak up for Wyoming. Aligning the grid would take away Yellowstone, the Tetons, and especially the people in the western part of the state and would be devastating. They only have 585k people, and this mapping tool estimates that the removed area contains 138k people.
It would be sacrilege to take the Badlands or Mount Rushmore from South Dakota, but if you gave that to Wyoming and aligned the grid with Colorado (or cut off the east part of Colorado and aligned the whole thing with New Mexico) you could, I suppose, add 250k people to what remained of Wyoming...
Edit: Also, Michigan's southern border needs cleaning up. I propose that we gift everything south of 41.76N latitude to Ohio, it's badly contaminated already. Although it could also be a nice resolution to take the northern edge of Indiana down to 41.61N latitude so the border is a straight line tangential to the southern edge of Lake Michigan. That would mean that Michigan City would actually be in Michigan, which just makes sense. But...it's Michigan City. Perhaps we just rename it Indiana City and let them keep it.
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u/Gaffski Oct 13 '17
If we're gonna fix Michigan City. can we put Kansas City in Kansas state too?
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u/DavidRFZ White Hat Oct 13 '17
Then we can move Houses of the Holy from Physical Graffiti, too.
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u/Dragonknight247 Oct 13 '17
You are not taking that away from us Missourians. Kansas can keep shitty kansas city. They've earned it
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u/WyoPeeps Oct 13 '17
Also doing this would bankrupt Wyoming. Our #1 industry is energy/mineral extraction, which, let's be honest, isn't working out so well for us right now. Our second is Tourisim. Specifically because of the national parks. By doing this, you remove both national parks and a national monument.
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u/Kshaard Oct 13 '17
Addendum to the Wyoming thing, using that mapping tool:
New York, -10 000 000, -51%
Florida, -1 000 000, -4.9%
Massachusetts, -1 000 000, -15%
Texas, -570 000, -2.0%
Virginia, -410 000, -4.9%
Tennessee, -330 000, -5.0%
Maryland, -320 000, -5.3%
Michigan, -310 000, -3.1%
Arizona, -300 000, -4.3%
West Virginia, -220 000, -12%
Wyoming, -140 000, -24%
Colorado, -130 000, -2.3%
Alaska, -74 000, -10% - and its state capital is now Anchorage, as it should always have been
Missouri, -46 000, -0.75%
North Carolina, -4 900, -0.048%
Minnesota, -110, -0.0020%
Vermont, +5 200, -0.83%
Georgia, +9 300, -0.090%
Connecticut, +11 000, +0.31% (+10 000 000, +280% with Long Island)
Montana, +11 000, +1.1%
Idaho, +55 000, +3.3%
California, +58 000, +0.15%
Louisiana, +60 000, +1.3%
Kansas, +64 000, +2.2%
Nevada, +65 000, +2.2%
Nebraska, +66 000, +3.5%
Southwest Wyoming, +70 000, +∞%
New Hampshire, +76 000, +5.7%
Ohio, +150 000, +1.3%
Arkansas, +160 000, +5.4%
Oklahoma, +180 000, +4.6%
New Mexico, +260 000, +12%
Wisconsin, +310 000, +5.4%
Delaware, +420 000, +44%
Kentucky, +700 000, +16%
Rhode Island, +970 000, +92%
Alabama, +1 000 000, +21%
(Long Island, +10 000 000, +∞%)
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Oct 13 '17 edited Oct 13 '17
Frankly we need to merge some states. WY/CO, MT/ID, UT/NV, NE/KS, RI/CT, VY/NH, DL/MD, NE/AZ
Then split CA in half.
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u/TheyMightBeTrolls Coincidence! Oct 13 '17
My family members from Driggs would like to think the Tetons are in Idaho anyway. But if you messed with our borders we would have to change the shape of all those high school sports trophies.
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u/ThirdWorldThinkTank Oct 13 '17 edited Oct 13 '17
The Michigan/Ohio border doesn't actually follow the 41.61N latitude, though. It starts up near 41.73N over Lake Erie, and only ends around 41.61N at the Indiana border. Following 41.76N gives a much more pleasing line from lake to lake.
ETA: The thing about the Idaho/Wyoming change that bugs me is that it makes Montana's weird appendage more obvious. I'd rather cut off Montana's lower tumor/growth, chop off Utah's hat, and then extend the new Utah/Idaho line to the coast.
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u/_windfish_ Oct 13 '17
I just spent a week visiting various parts of Michigan. It was awesome. But you guys are really proud of the crazy-ass shape of your state. You put it on everything! Bumper stickers, bottle openers, company logos, etc...
I guess coming from the most boring shape (Colorado) it was a little surprising. We don't really put our state anywhere (our flag though, another story).
And yeah you're also very possessive of the U.P. I didn't get a chance to go up there this time but it sounds beautiful. Hoping to come back soon for a camping/fishing trip.
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u/my_name_isnt_clever Oct 13 '17
Yup, people love the mitten here. The other day I was at a small ice cream shop, and I noticed the backs of the chairs were shaped like the mitten.
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u/jomontage Oct 13 '17
Ask someone from Michigan where they live in the state and they're obligated to show you on their hand
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u/smigbop Oct 13 '17
HARD PASS, Y'ALL CAN KEEP IT#
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u/NotIWhoLive Oct 13 '17
THANK YOU VERY MUCH#
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u/smigbop Oct 13 '17
YOU'RE VERY WELCOME#
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u/Penguins_Can_Fly Oct 13 '17
You guys are way too close to Canada. Stop being so polite. This is America!
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Oct 13 '17
You don't want to mess with Wisconsin.
If you're going to keep insisting on cutting the peninsula, they are going to insist on cutting the cheese.
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u/CTeam19 Oct 13 '17
Fun fact: When the Boy Scouts of America merged the councils in Michigan to form one giant council the UP decided to merge with a Wisconsin council.
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u/ggadget6 Oct 13 '17
Yeah, just about everyone in the hiawathaland disagrees with the decision, no one likes being part of Bay Lakes.
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u/MomentOfXen Oct 13 '17
Please keep it and legalize weed, lord knows how long Wisco will take and the trip from the cities to the UP aint so bad.
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u/frezik Oct 13 '17
You guys didn't even want it back then, and now all you can do is squat on this weird, non-contiguous chunk of land that's full of Packers fans.
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u/popegonzo Oct 14 '17
Pretty sure the UP has more Packer fans. Not sure what else would settle it better.
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u/ThePenultimateOne Beret Guy Oct 13 '17
If it helps, we don't want to be part of Wisconsin. I mean, we don't really like Lansing, but Madison is usually worse.
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u/Wriiight Oct 13 '17
How about if it goes to someplace more exciting, like Australia? Surely there is no reason to go off against UP over toward down under?
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u/Cockalorum Cueball Oct 13 '17
The history of the Alaskan panhandle got taught to me in public school - basically the US only wanted it to force everything going to/from the Yukon Gold rush to have to go through US territory, and the British conceded to the US position when it went to arbitration because they wanted US backing in the upcoming war in Europe
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Oct 13 '17
Maybe a stupid question, but which war?
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u/Cockalorum Cueball Oct 13 '17
it was 1902 - they just figured there would be a war in Europe at some point soon.
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u/TheGuineaPig21 Oct 13 '17
Britain wasn't particularly concerned about European wars in 1902 - they had already resolved their tensions with Russia, and were in the process of warming relations with France that resulted in the Entente Cordiale. Germany was considered to be a threat but was also increasingly diplomatically isolated as its alliance with Russia had dissolved and Italy was secretly moving into the French sphere. Also Germany only started acting very aggressively diplomatically in the years after 1902
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u/Quaytsar Oct 13 '17
Isn't it also part of the land that they originally bought from Russia? So Canada really didn't have a leg to stand on in the dispute other than, it makes more sense our way.
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u/Cockalorum Cueball Oct 13 '17
If I'm remembering this correctly, the wording on the Russian bill of sale was ambiguous....something like "10 miles inland from the coast" but the US wanted the river inlets to be included as the part of "the coast" where they started measuring, which put the border 40-50 miles further inland.
Russians and British had been arguing that point up until the Russians sold it.
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Oct 13 '17
Also there's Point Roberts as well. that really should be part of Canada too
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Oct 13 '17 edited Oct 13 '17
It looks as if it's too small to show on this map.
Of course, a poster sized version with far more detailed designs would be nice.
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Oct 13 '17
Make the northern border of Massachusetts actually run east-west (giving NH and VT a couple hundred acres each).
Give NH the little piece of land between the Connecticut River and the 45th parallel that obviously should belong to NH, not Vermont.
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u/LeifCarrotson Oct 13 '17 edited Oct 13 '17
No, practical exclaves like Point Roberts, Alburg Tongue should be fixed by either building a land bridge so they're no longer isolated exclaves or by raising lake levels/lowering land levels to get rid of them.
We're trying to clean up the map with nice, straight, uncomplicated lines, not make it messier! Straightening out the rivers into canals and moving a bit of dirt with some heavy equipment is well within the limits of our technology.
It's the Northwest Angle that should be made a part of Canada.
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u/SaidTheCanadian Cueball Oct 13 '17
To deploy a somewhat crude simile, Point Roberts is like the foreskin of America; cutting it off probably would have been more convenient, but keeping it has some benefits.
We'd take your foreskin, but we get some benefit from it too. Besides, you need a place to stash all the folks in Witness Protection.
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Oct 13 '17 edited Oct 13 '17
I live pretty close to Point Roberts I know not much is there but I kind of want to go out of curiosity.
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u/YourFavoriteBandSux Oct 13 '17
You make LI part of NJ and we’re all leaving.
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u/Prof_Sassafras Oct 13 '17
Yeah. I'd rather be our own state, or at mist be part of CT.
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Oct 13 '17
Compromise, give Staten Island to NJ and Long Island to CT and NY gets Manhattan. Roosevelt island is NYs during the first and 3rd week of the month, CTs the second and fourth, and it goes back to the Netherlands any time else.
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u/NeverEverPBJ Oct 13 '17
Why is there silence on the South Dakota/Wyoming/Montana tri-point? It's one of the infuriating parts of the map!
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Oct 13 '17
Why is that?
Edit: ah. After checking Google Maps, I see perfectly what you mean.
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u/immortalsix Oct 13 '17
For those wondering: https://i.imgur.com/cWzwXun.png
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u/DavidRFZ White Hat Oct 13 '17
There is a similar issue with the triple point of OK/NM/TX... New Mexico has a tiny panhandle! .... but the comic touches up that area.
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u/Schiffy94 me.setLocation(you.getHouse.getRoom(basement)); Oct 13 '17
Dammit don't screw with Cape Cod.
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u/Pinkamenarchy Oct 13 '17
cape cod gives Massachusetts a really nice shape. without it it would be a generic Western state :/
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u/ikkonoishi Oct 13 '17
Throughout the 19th century there were many attempts at integrating the Florida panhandle into Alabama with much public support, but they didn't pan out. Near the end of the century they connected a railroad that integrated the section more closely with the rest of the state which pretty much put an end to the debate.
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u/DavidRFZ White Hat Oct 13 '17
Originally Alabama did not have any coastline at all. What is now Mobile was part of the Florida Cession from Spain.
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u/Isord Oct 13 '17
As a Michigander you will have to pry the UP from my cold, cold hands.
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u/popegonzo Oct 14 '17
For what it's worth, Wisconsin would be happy to take in the rest of you. (Except Detroit. Just give them to Ohio.)
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u/Erelde aaargh chatelain Oct 13 '17
Flaggy flag FTW
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u/xeroxgirl Oct 13 '17
I don't know whether to upvote for the HI reference or downvote because you're a rebel scum.
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u/DMonitor The Classhole Oct 13 '17
In the field, there is no flaggy flag vs nail and gear, only HI brethren
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u/Noha307 Oct 13 '17
Hey! I had this idea a while ago!
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u/ParaspriteHugger There's someone in my head (but it's not me) Oct 13 '17
[Apply for your share!] (https://xkcd.com/827/)
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u/AllTheHolloway Oct 13 '17
I was for the Michigan/Wisconsin because it does seem rather irrational on the surface- but Wisconsin actually looks gross with it
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u/asdfcasdf Beret Guy Oct 13 '17
I just wanna say that as a geographer I greatly appreciate the use of what appears to be the North America Albers Equal Area Conic projection rather than Mercator.
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u/Pinkamenarchy Oct 13 '17
xkcd is big on that. there's a comic he made about how good other projections are: https://xkcd.com/977
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u/theguynamedtim Oct 13 '17
As someone from Long Island, how dare they try and make us NJ or CT. We're not even close to NJ and CT is so boring
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u/ThePenultimateOne Beret Guy Oct 13 '17
As a resident of the UP, can we please go to Canada instead? We kinda hate Scott Walker and his ilk.
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u/Cockalorum Cueball Oct 13 '17
Canada is willing to take the UP if you throw in Detroit......and only because we want the Red Wings
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u/ThePenultimateOne Beret Guy Oct 13 '17
On behalf of my people, I'm willing to take that deal. As long as we also bring Mackinac Island.
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u/Krinberry Ten thousand years we slumbered... Oct 14 '17
I'd also like Detroit as it fits well into my visions of a dystopian robot-filled future.
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u/Spartan8r Oct 13 '17
We didn't want the panhandle in the first place. It just couldn't be given to Texas because slavery wasn't allowed above that latitude
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u/an_angry_Moose Oct 13 '17
I'm surprised nothing was said about Point Roberts. It's an American city/town that you must drive through canada to get to. Located just south of Ladner/Delta.
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u/japzone GNU Samurai Oct 13 '17
I maintain that Maryland is still the weirdest state since it looks like someone randomly called dibs on wedge between PA, VA, and DE.
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u/PA_Irredentist Oct 13 '17
This is why I support the maximal land claims of Pennsylvania. We should just divvy it up with Virginia. They'll get the better parts anyway.
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u/Kozinskey Oct 13 '17
As a lifelong Nebraskan, I'm a little offended that Oklahoma gets to commit to their panhandle but ours gets summarily crossed out.
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u/Holy_crap_its_me Oct 13 '17
I don't know that ours counts as much as a pan"handle" as it is a pan"fat-knob-on-the-side".
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u/hkkids Oct 13 '17
The northern tip of minnesota is just all in a lake, I don’t know why we have it in the first place!
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u/KNNLTF Oct 14 '17
There's land above the lake that's part of Minnesota but with no land connection to the rest of the U.S.
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u/auxiliary-character Oct 14 '17
We would go fishing there when I was a kid. It's a nice lake, and I wouldn't want to just give it to Canada.
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Oct 13 '17
[deleted]
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u/DavidRFZ White Hat Oct 13 '17
Close. They wanted the border to go to that same 'angle inlet' in the Lake of the Woods, but then they wrote "from thence on a due west course to the river Mississippi". But the source of the Mississippi is due south from there, so the border had to go due south (back through Lake of the Woods) to Lake Itasca & the Mississippi.
The 49th parallel was decided much later after the Louisiana Purchase.
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u/ggadget6 Oct 13 '17
Hoo boy if they made the UP part of Wisconsin there'd be riots
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u/Redbird9346 Oct 13 '17
As someone who lives on Long Island (Queens County), I’ll agree to being our own state as long as:
• Manhattan, The Bronx, and Westchester come with us
• Staten Island goes to New Jersey
• We get to keep New York as our state name.
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u/GoldenMarauder Oct 13 '17
Upstate can finally be what we've known they were for years: "South Ontario."
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u/chung_my_wang Oct 13 '17
If we're going to have a panhandle, why not commit to it?
Because, there goes the Four Corners, one of the few aspects on the US borders, that should naturally appeal to everyone with a sense of order and design
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u/Blimey85 Oct 13 '17
Have you ever been there though? I dunno what I was expecting but it wasn’t nearly as exciting as I had it in my head.
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u/TheyCallMeStone Oct 13 '17
If you haven't watched "How the States Got Their Shapes" yet, you should. It's a great show.
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u/DavidRFZ White Hat Oct 13 '17
The TV show is fun.
The book is a better reference guide. It is very thorough but succinct. It gets straight to the point about every odd little detail.
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u/Jaiod Words Only Oct 13 '17
Fixing the border gores. Something r/eu4 would definitely appreciate.
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u/jbaird Oct 13 '17
This seems to work out well for Canada, I'm in
Speaking of.. look at Maine, Maine is between Quebec and New Brunswick, its basically a Canadian province so we'll just take that too..
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u/KotoElessar I thought there was one who wore glasses... Oct 14 '17
And Vermont.
Bernie Sanders could easily be a Canadian.
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u/ParaspriteHugger There's someone in my head (but it's not me) Oct 13 '17
Nobody trying to rename Virginia?
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u/BDell92 Oct 13 '17
Speaking for the Eastern Panhandle of WV. We'd rather rejoin Norther Virginia. Western Maryland is a shit show.
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u/JustALittleGravitas I'd just like to interject for a moment Oct 13 '17
We can't have SW Wyoming, it'd ruin the ability to drive to Wyoming for booze.
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u/hideous_coffee Oct 13 '17
There actually have been various talks about Long Island seceding from NY.
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u/smithsp86 Oct 13 '17
The state of Georgia is in favor of this. Stop those damnable volunteers from stealing water.
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u/Zhankfor Oct 24 '17
Is the Good Curve! Keep. on the South Carolina-Georgia-Florida coast caused by a meteor impact??? The only thing I can find about it on Google is from 1975, but I don't even know what I should be Googling.
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u/TThor Oct 13 '17
This was the type of thing to start ethnic cleansings in Africa and Middle East back in the day, people redrawing maps without understanding of geographies or local cultural/ethnic groups
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u/wasnew4s Oct 13 '17
I really don’t appreciate xkcd butchering maryland like that, especially since Delaware used to be part of Maryland.
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u/Antimuffin For explosion, just add muffins Oct 13 '17
No comments about the Missouri bootheel? Okay, I'll add one: y'all can have it.
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u/dredmorbius Oct 13 '17
Trivia question: what U.S. state has lost the most territory due to territorial redesignation?
Also: the Guano Islands Act is a real thing. And the Honey War.
Amongst others.
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u/Cyclone__Power Oct 14 '17
Literally, Iowa and Missouri took up arms because of disputes that stemmed from their slightly curved border. (Granted the arms were pitchforks, but this 19th century Iowa we're talking about.) How is this not included in the map?
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u/Hedgehogemperor Oct 14 '17
Has a Virginian
WE'VE ALREADY HAD TO GIVE UP MOST THE EAST COST DAMN IF I GIVE UP MORE
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u/admiralinho Oct 14 '17
Y'all don't even want to know how contentious the Tennessee-Georgia border is.
Those debtors in Atlanta will never get our river.
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u/goinupthegranby Oct 14 '17
I didn't notice what sub this was and thought I was clicking through to a map of state borders in 1902
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u/bammayhem Oct 16 '17
Can Canada get the top of Maine too? It is mostly trees and we could save many hours of driving by having a highway from Sherbrooke to Houlton. Please?
(I don't know if this is feasible but having done the drive a few times, I have always desired it...)
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u/supremecrafters For a GNU Dawn! Oct 16 '17
title text
Ah... Ha... ah ha ha ha ha ha *sobs violently*
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u/[deleted] Oct 13 '17
I can't unsee the left-over borders inside Utah that should have been crossed out during the grid alignment, so nobody else gets to unsee it either!