A classic is Carter Lake, Iowa, an enclave caused by the avulsion of the Missouri River that is essentially “in” Nebraska. It gave rise to a problem that is now a staple of the first year civil procedure curriculum in America law schools: Owen Equipment v. Kroger.
The Virginia-West Virginia boundary is still not final in some places. In 1991, the Virginia and West Virginia legislatures appropriated money for a boundary commission to look at 15 miles of fuzzy border between Loudoun County, Virginia and Jefferson County, West Virginia, after an assault prosecution was thrown out of court. Because the boundary was not clear, the Virginia Attorney General could not prove the crime took place in Virginia.
After a 1997 survey, the boundary line between Jefferson County, West Virginia, and Loudoun County, Virginia, was declared to be the watershed line of the top of the ridge of the Blue Ridge mountains, as documented in the survey. The topographic boundary was modified where Route 9 crossed the watershed divide. Previous road work had lowered the grade, and 800 feet of road traditionally maintained by Virginia were technically on the West Virginia side of the divide.
A fun border tidbit, one side of the family is from Weirton, WV a small former mill town in the northern panhandle. WV with two panhandles is full of oddities one being that the City borders PA to the east, OH to the west (spanning the entire width of the state at that point) while the northern and southern borders are both WV. If you were in Brooke County WV and wanted to go to Hancock County WV and didn’t want to drive through this 20 sq mile town you would have to leave the state. As far as I know there is no name for this circumstance sadly.
The former Geography teacher part of me loves the penne dish idea as a way to demonstrate the various "claves" definitions. That idea would make a fantastic lesson/class project. Well done!
The story of why Michigan has that particular penne-exclave is a fascinating footnote in early American history, which involves an actual shooting war between the state of Ohio and the territory of Michigan over possession of Toledo, and the resolution involved a bribe from Congress, a frostbitten convention, and the transfer of what is now the Upper Peninsula from the Wisconsin territory to the Michigan territory.
In the end it was a classic baseball-style three-way trade in which Ohio got Toledo, Michigan got the Upper Peninsula, and Wisconsin got nothing of value at all.
Your example map of the Michigan-Ohio border also points out a pet topic of mine: while a zoomed out view of the US state borders show a bunch of apparently straight lines especially toward the west, zoomed in, they are very crooked or skewed. The border segment shown shows a definite tilt from the southwest to northeast.
Some is due to limits of survey equipment during the 18th and 19th centuries, but others are due to poorly worded language in treaties or agreements (see DE-NJ-MD border), or the need to place an existing settlement into a specific state (eg MA-CT border).
A book which was helpful in understanding the history is “How the States Got Their Shapes” by Mark Stein.
A classic is Carter Lake, Iowa, an enclave caused by the avulsion of the Missouri River that is essentially “in” Nebraska. It gave rise to a problem that is now a staple of the first year civil procedure curriculum in America law schools: Owen Equipment v. Kroger.
Here's a boundary story you may enjoy:
The Virginia-West Virginia boundary is still not final in some places. In 1991, the Virginia and West Virginia legislatures appropriated money for a boundary commission to look at 15 miles of fuzzy border between Loudoun County, Virginia and Jefferson County, West Virginia, after an assault prosecution was thrown out of court. Because the boundary was not clear, the Virginia Attorney General could not prove the crime took place in Virginia.
After a 1997 survey, the boundary line between Jefferson County, West Virginia, and Loudoun County, Virginia, was declared to be the watershed line of the top of the ridge of the Blue Ridge mountains, as documented in the survey. The topographic boundary was modified where Route 9 crossed the watershed divide. Previous road work had lowered the grade, and 800 feet of road traditionally maintained by Virginia were technically on the West Virginia side of the divide.
From here: http://www.virginiaplaces.org/boundaries/wvboundary.html
The top of the ridge is where the Appalachian Trail runs and I've hiked there many times which is when I became aware of this boundary dispute.
A fun border tidbit, one side of the family is from Weirton, WV a small former mill town in the northern panhandle. WV with two panhandles is full of oddities one being that the City borders PA to the east, OH to the west (spanning the entire width of the state at that point) while the northern and southern borders are both WV. If you were in Brooke County WV and wanted to go to Hancock County WV and didn’t want to drive through this 20 sq mile town you would have to leave the state. As far as I know there is no name for this circumstance sadly.
The former Geography teacher part of me loves the penne dish idea as a way to demonstrate the various "claves" definitions. That idea would make a fantastic lesson/class project. Well done!
The story of why Michigan has that particular penne-exclave is a fascinating footnote in early American history, which involves an actual shooting war between the state of Ohio and the territory of Michigan over possession of Toledo, and the resolution involved a bribe from Congress, a frostbitten convention, and the transfer of what is now the Upper Peninsula from the Wisconsin territory to the Michigan territory.
In the end it was a classic baseball-style three-way trade in which Ohio got Toledo, Michigan got the Upper Peninsula, and Wisconsin got nothing of value at all.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toledo_War
Your example map of the Michigan-Ohio border also points out a pet topic of mine: while a zoomed out view of the US state borders show a bunch of apparently straight lines especially toward the west, zoomed in, they are very crooked or skewed. The border segment shown shows a definite tilt from the southwest to northeast.
Some is due to limits of survey equipment during the 18th and 19th centuries, but others are due to poorly worded language in treaties or agreements (see DE-NJ-MD border), or the need to place an existing settlement into a specific state (eg MA-CT border).
A book which was helpful in understanding the history is “How the States Got Their Shapes” by Mark Stein.
Looking forward to the week!
Penne Hardaway
The misbehaving customers should of course be called “penne the ass”