How the States Got Their Shapes [Hardcover]

Mark Stein (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 27, 2008

Why does Oklahoma have that panhandle? Did someone make a mistake?

We are so familiar with the map of the United States that our state borders seem as much a part of nature as mountains and rivers. Even the oddities—the entire state of Maryland(!)—have become so engrained that our map might as well be a giant jigsaw puzzle designed by Divine Providence. But that's where the real mystery begins. Every edge of the familiar wooden jigsaw pieces of our childhood represents a revealing moment of history and of, well, humans drawing lines in the sand.

How the States Got Their Shapes is the first book to tackle why our state lines are where they are. Here are the stories behind the stories, right down to the tiny northward jog at the eastern end of Tennessee and the teeny-tiny (and little known) parts of Delaware that are not attached to Delaware but to New Jersey.

How the States Got Their Shapes examines:

• Why West Virginia has a finger creeping up the side of Pennsylvania
• Why Michigan has an upper peninsula that isn't attached to Michigan
• Why some Hawaiian islands are not Hawaii
• Why Texas and California are so outsized, especially when so many Midwestern states are nearly identical in size

Packed with fun oddities and trivia, this entertaining guide also reveals the major fault lines of American history, from ideological intrigues and religious intolerance to major territorial acquisitions. Adding the fresh lens of local geographic disputes, military skirmishes, and land grabs, Mark Stein shows how the seemingly haphazard puzzle pieces of our nation fit together perfectly.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

America's first century was defined by expansion and the negotiation of territories among areas colonized by the French and Spanish, or occupied by natives. The exact location of borders became paramount; playwright and screenwriter Stein amasses the story of each state's border, channeling them into a cohesive whole. Proceeding through the states alphabetically, Stein takes the innovative step of addressing each border-north, south, east, west-separately. Border stories shine a spotlight on many aspects of American history: the 49th parallel was chosen for the northern borders of Minnesota, North Dakota, and Montana because they ensured England's access to the Great Lakes, vital to their fur trade; in 1846, Washington D.C. residents south of the Potomac successfully petitioned to rejoin Virginia (called both "retrocession" and "a crime") in order to keep out free African-Americans. Aside from tales of violent conquest and political glad-handing, there's early, breathtaking tales of American politicos' favorite sport, gerrymandering (in 1864, Idaho judge Sidney Edgerton single-handedly "derailed" Idaho's proposed boundary, to Montana's benefit, with $2,000 in gold). American history enthusiasts should be captivated by this fun, informative text.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

“Give me the splendid irregularities any day. God bless the panhandles and notches, the West Virginias and Oklahomas.” (Wall Street Journal )

“If you ever wondered why Delaware owns a small portion of the southwest New Jersey coast, the answer is here!” (Library Journal )

“A fascinating and wonderfully entertaining account of an often-overlooked oddity of America’s history: how the jigsaw-puzzle layout of the United States emerged. I never thought a book on geography could be funny, but Mark Stein has pulled it off.” (Vogue )

“For anyone who’s been confounded by the largest of all jigsaw puzzles, the one that carved out those fifty weirdly formed states, here is the solution. It’s history, it’s geography, it’s comedy, it’s indispensable.” (ANDRO LINKLATER, author of The Fabric of America: How Our Borders and Boundaries Shaped the Country and Forged Our National Identity )

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Smithsonian (May 27, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061431389
• ISBN-13: 978-0061431388
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.8 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (114 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #20,003 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #91 in Books > History > Historical Study > Social History

More About the Author

Mark Stein is the author of How the States Got Their Shapes, a New York Times Bestseller that became the basis of the History Channel series of the same name, in which he frequently appears. His new book, How the States Got Their Shapes Too: The People Behind the Borderlines focuses on individuals from Thomas Jefferson to Washington, DC's Eleanor Holmes Norton.

Stein wrote the screenplay for the film, Housesitter, starring Steve Martin and Goldie Hawn, and Movies-of-the-Week for CBS and NBC, starring Katey Sagal, John Ritter, Teri Garr, and Robert Urich. His plays have been produced off-Broadway at the Manhattan Theatre Club, and at numerous regional theatres including South Coast Repertory, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, the Manitoba Theatre Centre, L.A.'s Fountain Theatre and the Rubicon Theatre in Ventura, CA. He lives in Washington, D.C., where he has taught at Catholic University and American University.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

107 of 116 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It was not a drunken cartographer after all., June 7, 2008

By 

CenVillager "cenvillager" (Pembroke Pines, FL USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: How the States Got Their Shapes (Hardcover)

I won't try to compete with the detailed review above. I just want to add that I have been wondering about the odd shapes of the states for years, and wishing for info on this topic.

I was thrilled to see that this book was finally available.

The book has surpassed my expectations. The details are fabulous. The ample maps fully illustrate the narrative.

Each state is explained. For example, why does Rhode Island have "island" in it's name? Buy the book and find out.

When I lived in Mobile, I puzzled for years over Alabama's "tab" at the south. My guess was that it had something to do with giving the state a gulf shoreline. (Maybe for condos?) I was wrong. It's all Florida's fault.

In short, this book is fascinating! Even if you think you're not interested, you will be. The arcane knowledge you learn will make you the star of any party, or a total bore.

I love it!

44 of 52 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars this is NOT the first book on this subject, September 8, 2008

By 

Eyesk (from the swamps of Jersey) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: How the States Got Their Shapes (Hardcover)

Our library just got this book in, and it bothers me that the promotion of this book includes the falsehood that this is the first book to tackle how the states got their shapes... Just nine years ago, there was the book The Shape of the Nation-Why the States are Shaped Like That by Jim Feldman, which is arguably a better book and with better resources/references/footnotes. You might like to poke around a bit to see what else is out there (such as Mr. Feldman's book) before you invest the money and reading-time in this book.

20 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Some helpful information, but woefully incomplete, September 10, 2008

By 

Richard L. Goldfarb (Seattle, WA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: How the States Got Their Shapes (Hardcover)

There is a lot of useful information in this slim volume, but the omissions I know about without so much as cracking open a book indicate to me that the author didn't really do enough research to justify his grandiose title.

I enjoyed learning such things as how a small valley was transferred from Massachusetts to New York hundreds of years after their borders were presumably set. Indeed, I wondered why Arizona didn't seek to cede the isolated and ungovernable Colorado City, home of alleged polygamists, to Utah on the same basis. It was also interesting to learn about how some lines were mis-surveyed, though Stein could have gone into further depth as to why in some cases courts would allow this to continue.

Given that nearly every school child knows about the Mason-Dixon line, it would have seemed natural for Stein to cover their work in far more detail than he did.

But what really bugged me is that he totally missed a number of interesting issues relating to borders. For example, there was an arbitration between the U.S. and Canada over the border between Alaska and British Columbia in the panhandle region. This makes for interesting history, the idea that our border was subject to a vote of six people, three from each country. Stein doesn't mention it at all. There was a war called the Pig War, commemorated by a National Historic Site, over British and American claims to the San Juan and Gulf Islands off Washington. And why does the border, which follows the 49th parallel even to include a tiny, noncontiguous area called Point Roberts, suddenly head southward so that Vancouver Island isn't split between the U.S. and Canada? Not a word from Stein. Finally, Isle Royale, the largest island in Lake Superior, is (a) in the United States, not Canada; and (b) in Michigan, not Minnesota, to which it is far closer. Why? Not a word from Stein.

If these things, all of at least as much interest as the questions Stein does ask in his book, are not covered, what others of which I am unaware are not covered as well?