1.
Little Rock, Arkansas
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Little Rock is the capital and the most populous city of the U. S. state of Arkansas. It is also the county seat of Pulaski County and it was incorporated on November 7,1831, on the south bank of the Arkansas River close to the geographic center of the state. The city derives its name from a rock formation along the river, the capital of the Arkansas Territory was moved to Little Rock from Arkansas Post in 1821. The citys population was 193,524 at the 2010 census, Little Rock is a cultural, economic, government, and transportation center within Arkansas and the South. Little Rocks history is available through history museums, historic districts or neighborhoods like the Quapaw Quarter, the city is the headquarters of Dillards, Windstream Communications, Acxiom, Stephens Inc. University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Heifer International, the Clinton Foundation, other large corporations, such as Dassault Falcon Jet and LM Wind Power have large operations in the city. State government is an employer, with many offices being located in downtown Little Rock. Two Interstate highways, Interstate 30 and Interstate 40, meet in Little Rock, Little Rock derives its name from a small rock formation on the south bank of the Arkansas River called le petit rocher. The little rock was used by river traffic as a landmark. The little rock is across the river from big rock, a bluff at the edge of the river. Archeological artifacts provide evidence of Native Americans inhabiting Central Arkansas for thousands of years before Europeans arrived, the early inhabitants may have been the Folsom people, Bluff Dwellers, and Mississippian culture peoples who built earthwork mounds recorded in 1541 by Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto. Historical tribes of the area were the Caddo, Quapaw, Osage, Choctaw, Little Rock was named for a stone outcropping on the bank of the Arkansas River used by early travelers as a landmark. Le Petit Rocher, named in 1722 by French explorer and trader Jean-Baptiste Bénard de la Harpe, Travelers referred to the area as the Little Rock, and the landmark name stuck. Little Rock is located at 34°44′10″N 92°19′52″W, according to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 116.8 square miles, of which,116.2 square miles of it is land and 0.6 square miles of it is water. Little Rock is located on the bank of the Arkansas River in Central Arkansas. Fourche Creek and Rock Creek run through the city, and flow into the river, the western part of the city is located in the foothills of the Ouachita Mountains. Northwest of the city limits are Pinnacle Mountain and Lake Maumelle, the city of North Little Rock is located just across the river from Little Rock, but it is a separate city. North Little Rock was once the 8th ward of Little Rock, an Arkansas Supreme Court decision on February 6,1904, allowed the ward to merge with the neighboring town of North Little Rock
2.
United States
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Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography, climate and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
3.
Colorado
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Colorado is a state in the United States encompassing most of the Southern Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains. Colorado is part of the Western United States, the Southwestern United States, Colorado is the 8th most extensive and the 21st most populous of the 50 United States. The United States Census Bureau estimates that the population of Colorado was 5,540,545 on July 1,2016, the state was named for the Colorado River, which Spanish travelers named the Río Colorado for the ruddy silt the river carried from the mountains. The Territory of Colorado was organized on February 28,1861, Colorado is nicknamed the Centennial State because it became a state in the same year as the centennial of the United States Declaration of Independence. Colorado is noted for its landscape of mountains, forests, high plains, mesas, canyons, plateaus, rivers. Denver is the capital and the most populous city of Colorado, residents of the state are properly known as Coloradans, although the term Coloradoan has been used archaically and lives on in the title of Fort Collins newspaper, the Coloradoan. Colorado, Wyoming and Utah are the states which have boundaries defined solely by lines of latitude and longitude. The summit of Mount Elbert at 14,440 feet elevation in Lake County is the highest point in Colorado, Colorado is the only U. S. state that lies entirely above 1,000 meters elevation. The point where the Arikaree River flows out of Yuma County, Colorado and this point, which holds the distinction of being the highest low elevation point of any state, is higher than the high elevation points of 18 states and the District of Columbia. A little less than one half of the area of Colorado is flat, East of the Rocky Mountains are the Colorado Eastern Plains of the High Plains, the section of the Great Plains within Nebraska at elevations ranging from roughly 3,350 to 7,500 feet. The Colorado plains were mostly prairies, but they have many patches of forests, buttes. Eastern Colorado is presently covered in farmland and rangeland, along with small farming villages. Precipitation is fair, averaging from 15 to 25 inches annually, corn, wheat, hay, soybeans, and oats are all typical crops, and most of the villages and towns in this region boast both a water tower and a grain elevator. Irrigation water is available from the South Platte, the Arkansas River, and a few other streams, however, heavy use of ground water from wells for irrigation has caused underground water reserves to decline. As well as agriculture, eastern Colorado hosts considerable livestock, such as cattle ranches. Roughly 70% of Colorados population resides along the edge of the Rocky Mountains in the Front Range Urban Corridor between Cheyenne, Wyoming, and Pueblo, Colorado. This region is protected from prevailing storms that blow in from the Pacific Ocean region by the high Rockies in the middle of Colorado. The Front Range includes Denver, Boulder, Fort Collins, Loveland, Colorado Springs, Pueblo, Greeley and other townships, on the other side of the Rockies, the significant population centers in Western Colorado are the cities of Grand Junction, Durango, and Montrose
4.
Kansas
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Kansas /ˈkænzəs/ is a U. S. state located in the Midwestern United States. Its capital is Topeka and its largest city is Wichita, Kansas is named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribes name is said to mean people of the wind or people of the south wind. For thousands of years, what is now Kansas was home to numerous, tribes in the eastern part of the state generally lived in villages along the river valleys. Tribes in the part of the state were semi-nomadic and hunted large herds of bison. When it was opened to settlement by the U. S. Thus, the area was a hotbed of violence and chaos in its early days as these forces collided. The abolitionists eventually prevailed, and on January 29,1861, after the Civil War, the population of Kansas grew rapidly when waves of immigrants turned the prairie into farmland. By 2015, Kansas was one of the most productive agricultural states, producing high yields of wheat, corn, sorghum, and soybeans. Kansas, which has an area of 82,278 square miles is the 15th largest state by area and is the 34th most populous of the 50 United States with a population of 2,911,641, residents of Kansas are called Kansans, officially. Mount Sunflower is Kansass highest point at 4,041 feet, for a millennia, the land that is currently Kansas was inhabited by Native Americans. The first European to set foot in present-day Kansas was Francisco Vázquez de Coronado, in 1803, most of modern Kansas was secured by the United States as part of the Louisiana Purchase. Southwest Kansas, however, was still a part of Spain, Mexico, from 1812 to 1821, Kansas was part of the Missouri Territory. The Santa Fe Trail traversed Kansas from 1821 to 1880, transporting manufactured goods from Missouri and silver and furs from Santa Fe, wagon ruts from the trail are still visible in the prairie today. In 1827, Fort Leavenworth became the first permanent settlement of white Americans in the future state, the Kansas–Nebraska Act became law on May 30,1854, establishing the U. S. territories of Nebraska and Kansas, and opening the area to broader settlement by whites. Kansas Territory stretched all the way to the Continental Divide and included the sites of present-day Denver, Colorado Springs, Missouri and Arkansas sent settlers into Kansas all along its eastern border. These settlers attempted to sway votes in favor of slavery, the secondary settlement of Americans in Kansas Territory were abolitionists from Massachusetts and other Free-Staters, who attempted to stop the spread of slavery from neighboring Missouri. Directly presaging the American Civil War, these forces collided, entering into skirmishes that earned the territory the name of Bleeding Kansas, Kansas was admitted to the United States as a free state on January 29,1861, making it the 34th state to enter the Union. He was roundly condemned by both the conventional Confederate military and the partisan rangers commissioned by the Missouri legislature and his application to that body for a commission was flatly rejected due to his pre-war criminal record
5.
Oklahoma
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Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central United States. Oklahoma is the 20th-most extensive and the 28th-most populous of the 50 United States, the states name is derived from the Choctaw words okla and humma, meaning red people. The name was settled upon statehood, Oklahoma Territory and Indian Territory were merged, on November 16,1907, Oklahoma became the 46th state to enter the union. Its residents are known as Oklahomans, or informally Okies, and its capital, a major producer of natural gas, oil, and agricultural products, Oklahoma relies on an economic base of aviation, energy, telecommunications, and biotechnology. In 2007, it had one of the economies in the United States, ranking among the top states in per capita income growth. Oklahoma City and Tulsa serve as Oklahomas primary economic anchors, with nearly two-thirds of Oklahomans living within their metropolitan statistical areas. With small mountain ranges, prairie, mesas, and eastern forests, most of Oklahoma lies in the Great Plains, Cross Timbers, interior Highlands—a region especially prone to severe weather. The name Oklahoma comes from the Choctaw phrase okla humma, literally meaning red people, equivalent to the English word Indian, okla humma was a phrase in the Choctaw language used to describe Native American people as a whole. Oklahoma later became the de facto name for Oklahoma Territory, and it was approved in 1890. Oklahoma is the 20th-largest state in the United States, covering an area of 69,898 square miles and it is one of six states on the Frontier Strip and lies partly in the Great Plains near the geographical center of the 48 contiguous states. It is bounded on the east by Arkansas and Missouri, on the north by Kansas, on the northwest by Colorado, on the far west by New Mexico, much of its border with Texas lies along the Southern Oklahoma Aulacogen, a failed continental rift. The geologic figure defines the placement of the Red River, the Oklahoma panhandles Western edge is out of alignment with its Texas border. The Oklahoma/New Mexico border is actually 2.1 to 2.2 miles east of the Texas line, the border between Texas and New Mexico was set first as a result of a survey by Spain in 1819. It was then set along the 103rd Meridian, in the 1890s, when Oklahoma was formally surveyed using more accurate surveying equipment and techniques, it was discovered the Texas line was not set along the 103rd Meridian. Surveying techniques were not as accurate in 1819, and the actual 103rd Meridian was approximately 2.2 miles to the east and it was much easier to leave the mistake than for Texas to cede land to New Mexico to correct the surveying error. The placement of the Oklahoma/New Mexico border represents the true 103rd Meridian, cimarron County in Oklahomas panhandle is the only county in the United States that touches four other states, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado and Kansas. Its highest and lowest points follow this trend, with its highest peak, Black Mesa, at 4,973 feet above sea level, situated near its far northwest corner in the Oklahoma Panhandle. The states lowest point is on the Little River near its far southeastern boundary near the town of Idabel, Oklahoma, which dips to 289 feet above sea level
6.
Arkansas
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Arkansas is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. Its name is of Siouan derivation from the language of the Osage denoting their related kin, the states diverse geography ranges from the mountainous regions of the Ozark and the Ouachita Mountains, which make up the U. S. Interior Highlands, to the forested land in the south known as the Arkansas Timberlands, to the eastern lowlands along the Mississippi River. Arkansas is the 29th largest by area and the 33rd most populous of the 50 United States, the capital and most populous city is Little Rock, located in the central portion of the state, a hub for transportation, business, culture, and government. The northwestern corner of the state, such as the Fayetteville–Springdale–Rogers Metropolitan Area and Fort Smith metropolitan area, is a population, education, the largest city in the eastern part of the state is Jonesboro. The largest city in the part of the state is Pine Bluff. The Territory of Arkansas was admitted to the Union as the 25th state on June 15,1836, in 1861 Arkansas withdrew from the United States and joined the Confederate States of America during the Civil War. Upon returning to the Union in 1868, the state would continue to suffer due to its reliance on slavery. White rural interests continued to dominate the politics until the Civil Rights Movement. Arkansas began to diversify its economy following World War II and relies on its service industry, aircraft, poultry, steel, tourism, cotton, and rice. The culture of Arkansas is observable in museums, theaters, novels, television shows, restaurants, wright, and physicist William L. McMillan, who was a pioneer in superconductor research, have all lived in Arkansas. The name Arkansas derives from the root as the name for the state of Kansas. The Kansa tribe of Native Americans are closely associated with the Sioux tribes of the Great Plains, the word Arkansas itself is a French pronunciation of a Quapaw word, akakaze, meaning land of downriver people or the Sioux word akakaze meaning people of the south wind. In 2007, the legislature passed a non-binding resolution declaring the possessive form of the states name to be Arkansass which has been followed increasingly by the state government. Arkansas borders Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, Oklahoma to the west, Missouri to the north, as well as Tennessee, the United States Census Bureau classifies Arkansas as a southern state, sub-categorized among the West South Central States. The state line along the Mississippi River is indeterminate along much of the border with Mississippi due to these changes. Arkansas can generally be split into two halves, the highlands in the northwest half and the lowlands of the southeastern half, the highlands are part of the Southern Interior Highlands, including The Ozarks and the Ouachita Mountains. The southern lowlands include the Gulf Coastal Plain and the Arkansas Delta and this dual split can yield to general regions named northwest, southwest, northeast, southeast, or central Arkansas
7.
Great Plains
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The region is known for supporting extensive cattle ranching and dry farming. The Canadian portion of the Plains is known as the Prairies, some geographers include some territory of northern Mexico in the Plains, but many stop at the Rio Grande. The term Great Plains is used in the United States to describe a sub-section of the even more vast Interior Plains physiographic division and it also has currency as a region of human geography, referring to the Plains Indians or the Plains States. There is no region referred to as the Great Plains in The Atlas of Canada, in terms of human geography, the term prairie is more commonly used in Canada, and the region is known as the Prairie Provinces or simply the Prairies. The region is about 500 mi east to west and 2,000 mi north to south, much of the region was home to American bison herds until they were hunted to near extinction during the mid/late 19th century. It has an area of approximately 500,000 sq mi, current thinking regarding the geographic boundaries of the Great Plains is shown by this map at the Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska–Lincoln. The term Great Plains, for the region west of about the 96th or 98th meridian, nevin Fennemans 1916 study, Physiographic Subdivision of the United States, brought the term Great Plains into more widespread usage. Before that the region was almost invariably called the High Plains, today the term High Plains is used for a subregion of the Great Plains. The Great Plains are the westernmost portion of the vast North American Interior Plains, during the Cretaceous Period, the Great Plains were covered by a shallow inland sea called the Western Interior Seaway. However, during the Late Cretaceous to the Paleocene, the seaway had begun to recede, leaving thick marine deposits. During the Cenozoic era, specifically about 25 million years ago during the Miocene and Pliocene epochs, existing forest biomes declined and grasslands became much more widespread. The grasslands provided a new niche for mammals, including many ungulates and glires, traditionally, the spread of grasslands and the development of grazers have been strongly linked. The vast majority of animals became extinct in North America at the end of the Pleistocene. In general, the Great Plains have a variety of weather through the year, with very cold and harsh winters and very hot. Wind speeds are very high, especially in winter. Grasslands are among the least protected biomes, humans have converted much of the prairies for agricultural purposes or to create pastures. The Great Plains have dust storms mostly every year or so, the 100th meridian roughly corresponds with the line that divides the Great Plains into an area that receive 20 in or more of rainfall per year and an area that receives less than 20 in. The region is subjected to extended periods of drought, high winds in the region may then generate devastating dust storms
8.
Mississippi River
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The Mississippi River is the chief river of the largest drainage system on the North American continent. Flowing entirely in the United States, it rises in northern Minnesota, with its many tributaries, the Mississippis watershed drains all or parts of 31 U. S. states and 2 Canadian provinces between the Rocky and Appalachian Mountains. The Mississippi ranks as the fourth longest and fifteenth largest river in the world by discharge, the river either borders or passes through the states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana. Native Americans long lived along the Mississippi River and its tributaries, most were hunter-gatherers, but some, such as the Mound Builders, formed prolific agricultural societies. The arrival of Europeans in the 16th century changed the way of life as first explorers, then settlers. The river served first as a barrier, forming borders for New Spain, New France, and the early United States, and then as a vital transportation artery and communications link. Formed from thick layers of the silt deposits, the Mississippi embayment is one of the most fertile agricultural regions of the country. In recent years, the river has shown a shift towards the Atchafalaya River channel in the Delta. The word itself comes from Messipi, the French rendering of the Anishinaabe name for the river, see below in the History section for additional information. In addition to historical traditions shown by names, there are at least two measures of a rivers identity, one being the largest branch, and the other being the longest branch. Using the largest-branch criterion, the Ohio would be the branch of the Lower Mississippi. Using the longest-branch criterion, the Middle Mississippi-Missouri-Jefferson-Beaverhead-Red Rock-Hellroaring Creek River would be the main branch and its length of at least 3,745 mi is exceeded only by the Nile, the Amazon, and perhaps the Yangtze River among the longest rivers in the world. The source of this waterway is at Browers Spring,8,800 feet above sea level in southwestern Montana and this is exemplified by the Gateway Arch in St. Louis and the phrase Trans-Mississippi as used in the name of the Trans-Mississippi Exposition. It is common to qualify a regionally superlative landmark in relation to it, the New Madrid Seismic Zone along the river is also noteworthy. These various basic geographical aspects of the river in turn underlie its human history and present uses of the waterway, the Upper Mississippi runs from its headwaters to its confluence with the Missouri River at St. Louis, Missouri. The source of the Upper Mississippi branch is traditionally accepted as Lake Itasca,1,475 feet above sea level in Itasca State Park in Clearwater County, however, the lake is in turn fed by a number of smaller streams. From its origin at Lake Itasca to St. Louis, Missouri, fourteen of these dams are located above Minneapolis in the headwaters region and serve multiple purposes, including power generation and recreation. The remaining 29 dams, beginning in downtown Minneapolis, all locks and were constructed to improve commercial navigation of the upper river
9.
Fountain Creek (Arkansas River)
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Fountain Creek is a stream that originates in Woodland Park, Teller and flows through El Paso County to Pueblo in Pueblo County, Colorado. The 74. 5-mile-long creek, once known as the Fontaine qui Bouille, is a tributary of the Arkansas River, the Fountain Creek Watershed—located in Teller, El Paso, and Pueblo counties—is 930 square miles in area. Its borders are Pikes Peak, the Palmer Divide and a minor divide east of Colorado Springs, Monument Creek, which originates on Rampart Range, is the main tributary. Other key tributaries are Sand Creek and Jimmy Cap Creek, Fountain Creek and its tributaries flow through Woodland Park, Green Mountain Falls, Palmer Lake, Monument, Manitou Springs, Colorado Springs, and Pueblo. Fountain Creeks elevation ranges from 14,114 to 4,640 feet from Pikes Peak to where it meets the Arkansas River in Pueblo, with the significant elevation changes, there are diverse ecosystems and extreme temperature and precipitation variations. In 1999,70 million gallons of raw sewage spilled into the creek during a flood, sewage backed up into houses and wastewater pipes in the sewer system were cracked. That wiped out our whole wastewater system and we lost about 68 million gallons of wastewater - untreated sewage, said Steve Berry, a spokesman for the utility. Between 1988 and 2003, there was a total of 74 million gallons of raw sewage spilled into Fountain Creek. There were continued sewage spills in 2004, in 2005, there were more than 300,000 gallons of nonpotable water and sewage spills, which resulted in a fine of $130,000 to Colorado Springs Utilities by the Colorado Department of Health. Changes required of the utility to improve the system could cost up to $40 million by 2012. In total, the utility expects to spend $250 million by 2025 to improve its sewer system, according to The Gazette in 2007, untreated sewage spills into the creek an average of 10 times every year. Most of the spills occurred before 2006, but there were still spills. The sewage spills polluted the Creek, which was of concern to downstream users. The E. coli levels were high in the summer. Using microbial source tracking and DNA tracking, birds were identified and validated via water quality testing as the source of summer increases in E. coli, Colorado Springs Utilities, after almost ten years, had its compliance order with the states Water Quality Control Division closed in 2013. The utility spent more than $170 million on improvements to the system and $450,000 in penalties regarding sewage spills into Fountain Creek. In 2014, a $145 bonding plan that would have included a regional stormwater project was voted down and it would have created a partnership with El Paso County, Green Mountain Falls, Manitou Springs, and Fountain to implement flood control projects. Fountain Creek was identified as impaired due to levels of selenium, picked up from the soil by ground and surface water
10.
Little Arkansas River
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The Little Arkansas River is a river in the central Great Plains of North America. A tributary of the Arkansas River, its entire 123-mile length lies within the American state of Kansas, the river originates in central Kansas in the Smoky Hills region of the Great Plains. Its source lies in extreme south-central Ellsworth County immediately north of Geneseo, from there, the river flows generally south-southeast along the border between the Arkansas River Lowlands to the southwest and the McPherson Lowlands to the northeast. It joins the Arkansas River immediately northwest of downtown Wichita, Kansas, a statue, The Keeper of the Plains by local artist Blackbear Bosin, marks the confluence of these two rivers. List of rivers of Kansas U. S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System, Little Arkansas River
11.
Walnut River (Kansas)
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The Walnut River is a tributary of the Arkansas River,154 miles long, in the Flint Hills region of Kansas in the United States. Via the Arkansas, it is part of the Mississippi River watershed, according to the GNIS, the river has also been known in the past as the Little Verdigris River. The Walnut River rises in northern Butler County and flows southward through Butler and Cowley Counties, past the towns of El Dorado, Augusta, Winfield. It joins the Arkansas River at Arkansas City, the Walnuts principal tributaries are the Whitewater River, which joins it at Augusta, and the Little Walnut River, which joins it in southern Butler County. The Walnut River drainage basin comprises 2,380 square miles in an ecoregion characterized by rocky, rolling hills, elevations range from 1,050 to 1,625 feet in the basin. Average precipitation, mostly summer rainfall, varies from 32 to 38 inches annually, tallgrass prairie is the most common vegetation, covering 66 percent of the land. Crop land covers 23 percent and woodlands cover five percent, major crops are wheat, soybeans, cotton, hay, sorgum, and corn. Cattle are the most important livestock, upstream of El Dorado, a U. S. Army Corps of Engineers dam causes the river to form El Dorado Lake, along which a Kansas state park has been designated. The lake consists of about 8,000 acres of water with another 8,000 acres of land along its shores designated as park and wildlife areas. The other large lake in the Walnut River basin is Winfield City Lake with 1,250 acres of water surrounded by 1,150 acres of parkland, both lakes offer recreational opportunities including fishing, boating, hunting, camping, and wildlife observation. In Winfield, the east side of the old Tunnel Mill Dam is a fishing spot. It is staged directly near the old Kickapoo Corral, the west side of the dam and the Kickapoo Corral are both privately owned and closed to the public. A whirlpool is created by a hole in solid limestone about 15 feet down on the river bed directly off the cliffs of the Corral, the bottom is sandy and somewhat rocky. Near the mouth of the Walnut River, in eastern Arkansas City, are a number of archaeological sites. These are believed to be the remains of an Indian settlement visited in 1601 by New Mexico governor Juan de Oñate and they were almost certainly Wichita Indians. Based on Oñates description of the settlement,10,000 or more Wichita lived along several miles of the Walnut River, the Walnut Valley Festival is held along the banks in Winfield. List of Kansas rivers Columbia Gazetteer of North America entry DeLorme, Corps of Engineers El Dorado Lake website El Dorado State Park website U. S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System, Walnut River
12.
Verdigris River
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The Verdigris River /ˈvɜːrdᵻɡrɪs/ is a tributary of the Arkansas River in southeastern Kansas and northeastern Oklahoma in the United States. It is about 310 miles long, via the Arkansas, it is part of the Mississippi River watershed. The Verdigris is formed near Madison, Kansas, by the convergence of two short streams, its North and South forks, and flows generally southward throughout its course. South of Coffeyville, Kansas, the river enters Oklahoma and it joins the Arkansas River near Muskogee, Oklahoma, about a mile upstream of the mouth of the Neosho River. The area of convergence of the three rivers Arkansas, Verdigris and Neosho is called Three Forks, the river is mentioned in accounts by Zebulon Pike, Thomas Nuttall. Fur traders had numerous posts along its route where they met with Native Americans to exchange goods for furs, the river is also mentioned in the novel Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder, of her memories when her family moved to Kansas from Wisconsin. The name is derived from the Spanish words verde, meaning green, according to the Encyclopædia Britannica, the name may be derived from a gray-green substance resembling a copper ore, which tinged the water. In the US treaty of 1834 with the Cherokee Indians, the river was named as a part of the boundary of their lands in the Indian Territory. In July 2007, Coffeyville Resources suffered flooding at its refinery at Coffeyville by the Verdigris River, the company made efforts to ameliorate the damage. Several dams built by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers cause the Verdigris to form Toronto Lake near Toronto, Kansas and Oologah Lake near Oologah, more dams and reservoirs are downstream along the Arkansas River. From just north of Catoosa, Oklahoma to the confluence with the Arkansas. In Kansas, the Verdigris collects the Fall River at the town of Neodesha, in Oklahoma it collects the Caney River in Rogers County. S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System, Verdigris River
13.
Neosho River
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The Neosho River is a tributary of the Arkansas River in eastern Kansas and northeastern Oklahoma in the United States. Its tributaries also drain portions of Missouri and Arkansas, the river is about 463 miles long. Via the Arkansas, it is part of the Mississippi River watershed and its name is an Osage word meaning clear water. The Neoshos headwaters are in Morris County, Kansas, and it flows southeast through Kansas, in Ottawa County, Oklahoma, the river turns south-southwest for the remainder of its course through Oklahoma. It meets the Arkansas River near the city of Muskogee, about a mile downstream of the confluence of the Arkansas River, the area of convergence of the three rivers Arkansas, Verdigris and Neosho is called Three Forks. In Oklahoma the Neosho ends at its confluence with Spring River at Twin Bridges State Park, from that point on it is called the Grand River. The Grand River flows south to the Grand Lake, the Neosho has been dammed at several points along its course, in most cases by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers. In Kansas, a dam upstream of Council Grove forms Council Grove Lake, there are also 12 dams in between John Redmond and the Kansas border. In Oklahoma, a dam at Langley forms the Neoshos largest reservoir, a dam near Locust Grove forms Lake Hudson, and a dam upstream of Fort Gibson forms Fort Gibson Lake. In Kansas, the Neosho is joined by the Cottonwood River in Lyon County, in Oklahoma, it is joined by the Spring River in Ottawa County and the Elk River in Delaware County
14.
Cimarron River (Arkansas River tributary)
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The Cimarron River extends 698 miles across New Mexico, Oklahoma, Colorado, and Kansas. The headwaters flow from Johnson Mesa west of Folsom in northeastern New Mexico, much of the rivers length lies in Oklahoma, where it either borders or passes through eleven counties. There are no major cities along its route, the Cimarron drains a basin that encompasses about 18,927 square miles. The rivers present name comes from the early Spanish name, Río de los Carneros Cimarrón, early American explorers also called it the Red Fork of the Arkansas because of waters red color. Early explorers and map-makers called it by other names, including Grand Saline, Jefferson, Red Fork, Salt Fork. In New Mexico and extreme western Oklahoma the river is known as the Dry Cimarron River and this is by contrast to a wetter Cimarron River located further west and flows only through New Mexico. The Dry Cimarron River is not completely dry but sometimes its water disappears entirely under the sand in the river bed, the Dry Cimarron Scenic Byway follows the river from Folsom to the Oklahoma border. In Oklahoma the river flows along the edges of Black Mesa. As it first crosses the Kansas border, the flows through the Cimarron National Grassland. The quality of Cimarron water is rated as poor because the flows through natural mineral deposits, salt plains, and saline springs. It also collects quantities of red soil, which it carries to its terminus, before the Keystone Dam was built, this silt was sufficient to discolor the Arkansas River downstream. The first Europeans to see the Cimarron River were apparently Spanish conquistadores led by Francisco Vásquez de Coronado in 1541, the Spanish seemed to do little to exploit the area. The Osage tribe claimed most of the territory west of the confluence of the Cimarron, in 1819, Thomas Nuttall explored the lower Cimarron and wrote a report describing the flora and fauna that he found there. In 1821, Mexico threw off Spanish rule and William Becknell opened the Santa Fe Trail. One branch of the Santa Fe Trail, known variously as the Cimarron Route, the Cimarron Cutoff, lower Cimarron Spring on the bank of the river was an important watering and camping spot. In 1831 Comanche Indians killed Jedediah Smith on the Santa Fe Trail near the Cimarron River, in 1834 General Henry Leavenworth established Camp Arbuckle at the mouth of the Cimarron River. This fort, later known as Old Fort Arbuckle, was active for about a year. It should not be confused with the later Fort Arbuckle in Garvin County, Historic sites along the river include the ruins of Camp Nichols, a stone fort built by Kit Carson in 1865 to protect travelers from raids by Plains Indians on the Cimarron Cutoff
15.
Salt Fork Arkansas River
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The Salt Fork of the Arkansas River is a 239-mile-long tributary of the Arkansas River in southern Kansas and northern Oklahoma in the United States. Via the Arkansas River, it is part of the watershed of the Mississippi River and it flows into the Arkansas River in southern Kay County,7 miles south of Ponca City. In Alfalfa County, a dam on the river maintains Great Salt Plains Lake, which is lined with salt flats and is the site of Great Salt Plains National Wildlife Refuge and a state park. The Salt Forks largest tributaries are the Medicine Lodge River, which joins it in Alfalfa County and the Chikaskia River, which joins it in Kay County
16.
Canadian River
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The Canadian River is the longest tributary of the Arkansas River. It is about 906 miles long, starting in Colorado and traveling through New Mexico, the Texas Panhandle, the drainage area is about 47,700 square miles. The Canadian is sometimes referred to as the South Canadian River to differentiate it from the North Canadian River that flows into it and it is unclear why the river is called the Canadian. Fremonts route map of 1845, the name is listed as Goo-al-pah or Canadian River from the Comanche. According to the Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture, Spanish explorers in the 17th and 18th centuries called it the Rio Buenaventura, the upper part was called Rio Colorado by the Spanish. The name could be of Spanish origin from the word cañada, as the Canadian River formed a canyon in northern New Mexico. A few historical records document this explanation, edward Hale, writing in 1929, considered the French origin of the name most probable. The first European to explore the Canadian River was Juan de Oñate, the Spanish Governor of New Mexico, Spanish traders and hunters were soon actively working in this area. French voyageurs were active along the lower Canadian, bénard de la Harpe explored between the mouth of the river and the Kiamichi Mountains in 1715. Pierre and Paul Mallet followed the length of the river in 1740. The Louisiana Purchase in 1803 resulted in all of the land east of the New Mexico border being acquired by the United States. In 1818, the Quapaw tribe ceded all its land north of the Canadian to the United States, in 1825, the Osage ceded their claims to land along the river. The Canadian was designated as the boundary between the Creek-Seminole lands on the side and the Choctaw on the south side. Major Stephen H. Long led an expedition up the Canadian River in 1821 and he proclaimed the land along the river as, the Great American Desert. Despite this assessment, trading posts were established along the river, camp Holmes was established by Colonel Henry Dodges Dragoons in 1834. Captain Nathan Boone led a dragoon troop up the river to the 100th Meridian, the Treaty of Doaks Stand in 1820, made the Canadian River the northern boundary of the Choctaw Nation. Early immigrants to California followed the bank of the Canadian to Santa Fe. In 1845 the river was explored by Lieutenants James William Abert and their journey was chronicled in the Journal of Lieutenant J. W. Abert from Bent’s Fort to St. Louis, first published in 1846
17.
Poteau River
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The Poteau River is a 141-mile long river located in the U. S. states of Arkansas and Oklahoma. It is the river in Oklahoma that flows north and is the seventh largest river in the state. It is a tributary of the Arkansas River, which itself is a tributary of the Mississippi River, Poteau is the French word for post and it is believed that the river was named by French explorers who used a post or stake to mark the mouth of the river. The nearby city of Poteau, Oklahoma takes its name from the river, tributaries of the Poteau River include the Fourche Maline, Brazil and Sans Bois Creeks. Notable towns located along the river, in order from source to mouth, include Wister, Heavener, Poteau, Panama, Spiro, Fort Coffee and Fort Smith in Arkansas. Lake Wister is a created by the damming of the Poteau River near river mile 70 by Wister Dam which was built in December 1949. Lake Wister State Park has since been built around the reservoir, the lake and dam both take their name from the nearby town of Wister, Oklahoma. The evidence surrounding these claims is sparse and inconsistent, however, the most credible artifact discovered is the Heavener Runestone, which can be seen in Heavener Runestone Park located in Heavener, Oklahoma. U. S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System, Poteau River
18.
Pueblo, Colorado
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Pueblo /ˈpwɛbloʊ/ is a home rule municipality that is the county seat and the most populous city of Pueblo County, Colorado, United States. The population was 106,595 in 2010 census, making it the 267th most populous city in the United States, Pueblo is the heart of the Pueblo Metropolitan Statistical Area totaling over 160,000 people and an important part of the Front Range Urban Corridor. As of 2014, Pueblo is the city of the Pueblo-Cañon City combined statistical area totaling approximately 208,000 people. Pueblo is situated at the confluence of the Arkansas River and Fountain Creek,112 miles south of the Colorado State Capitol in Denver, the area is considered semi-arid desert land, with approximately 12 inches of precipitation annually. With its location in the Banana Belt, Pueblo tends to get less snow than the major cities in Colorado. Pueblo is one of the largest steel-producing cities in the United States, the Historic Arkansas River Project is a river walk in the Union Avenue Historic Commercial District, and shows the history of the devastating Pueblo Flood of 1921. Pueblo has the least expensive real estate of all major cities in Colorado. The median home price for homes on the market in Pueblo is $147,851 as of February 2013 and it is the sixth most affordable place to live in America as measured by the 2014 Cost of Living Index. Costs of housing, goods and services, utilities, transportation, groceries, Pueblo was listed by AARP in 2013 as one of the Best Places to Live in the USA. James Beckwourth, George Simpson, and other such as Mathew Kinkead. George married Juana Maria Suaso and lived there for a year or two before moving, however, Simpson had no title to the land. The adobe structures were built with the intention of settlement and trade next to the Arkansas River, about a dozen families lived there, trading with Native American tribes for hides, skins, livestock, as well as cultivated plants, and liquor. Evidence of this trade, as well as other utilitarian goods and they allegedly killed between fifteen and nineteen men, as well as captured two children and one woman. The trading post was abandoned after the raid, but it became important again between 1858 and 1859 during the Colorado Gold Rush of 1859, the current city of Pueblo represents the consolidation of four towns, Pueblo, South Pueblo, Central Pueblo, and Bessemer. Pueblo, South Pueblo, and Central Pueblo legally consolidated as the City of Pueblo between March 9 and April 6,1886. The consolidated city became an economic and social center of Colorado, and was home to important early Colorado families such as the Thatchers, the Ormans. One author crowed of Pueblo that the necessity exists no longer for Sharps rifles and these have been supplied by the plow and the mowing-machine. Steel emerged as a key industry very early, and in 1909 the city was considered the only town west of the Mississippi River
19.
Wichita, Kansas
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Wichita is the largest city in the state of Kansas and the 48th-largest city in the United States. Located in south-central Kansas on the Arkansas River, Wichita is the county seat of Sedgwick County, as of the 2010 United States Census, the city population was 382,368, as of 2014, it was estimated to have increased to 389,965. In 2015, the population of the Wichita metropolitan area was 644,610. The city began as a trading post on the Chisholm Trail in the 1860s and it subsequently became a key destination for cattle drives traveling north from Texas to access railroads, earning it the nickname Cowtown. In the 1920s and 1930s, businessmen and aeronautical engineers established a number of aircraft manufacturing companies in Wichita including Beechcraft, Cessna. The city transformed into a hub of U. S. aircraft production, in 1937, the city of Wichita established their official flag. As an industrial hub and the largest city in the state, Wichita is a center of culture, media. It hosts several museums, theatres, parks, and entertainment venues. Several universities are located in the city including Wichita State University, the citys daily newspaper, The Wichita Eagle, has the highest circulation of any newspaper in Kansas, and the Wichita broadcast television market includes the western two-thirds of the state. Wichita is also home to the Century II Performing Arts & Convention Center and Kansass largest airport, archaeological evidence indicates human habitation near the confluence of the Arkansas and Little Arkansas Rivers, the site of present-day Wichita, as early as 3000 B. C. In 1541, a Spanish expedition led by explorer Francisco Vázquez de Coronado found the area populated by the Quivira, or Wichita, conflict with the Osage in the 1750s drove the Wichita further south. Prior to American settlement of the region, the site was located in the territory of the Kiowa, the Wichita returned in 1864 due to the American Civil War and established a settlement on the banks of the Little Arkansas. During this period, trader Jesse Chisholm established a trading post at the site, after the war, the Wichita permanently relocated south to Indian Territory. In 1868, trader James R. Mead established another trading post at the site, and surveyor Darius Munger built a house for use as a hotel, community center, Business opportunities attracted area hunters and traders, and a new settlement began to form. That summer, Mead and others organized the Wichita Town Company, in 1870, Munger and German immigrant William Dutch Bill Greiffenstein filed plats laying out the citys first streets. Wichita formally incorporated as a city on July 21,1870, Wichitas position on the Chisholm Trail made it a destination for cattle drives traveling north from Texas to access railroads which led to markets in eastern U. S. cities. The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway reached the city in 1872, as a result, Wichita became a railhead for the cattle drives, earning it the nickname Cowtown. Across the Arkansas River, the town of Delano became an entertainment destination for cattlemen thanks to its saloons, brothels
20.
Tulsa, Oklahoma
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Tulsa /ˈtʌlsə/ is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 47th-most populous city in the United States. As of July 2015, the population was 403,505 and it is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with 981,005 residents in the MSA and 1,151,172 in the CSA. The city serves as the county seat of Tulsa County, the most densely populated county in Oklahoma, with urban development extending into Osage, Rogers, Tulsa was settled between 1828 and 1836 by the Lochapoka Band of Creek Native American tribe. For most of the 20th century, the city held the nickname Oil Capital of the World, once heavily dependent on the oil industry, Tulsa experienced economic downturn. Subsequent diversification efforts created a base in the energy, finance, aviation, telecommunications. The Tulsa Port of Catoosa, at the head of the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System, is the most inland port in the U. S. with access to international waterways. Two institutions of education within the city have sports teams at the NCAA Division I level, Oral Roberts University. It is situated on the Arkansas River at the foothills of the Ozark Mountains in northeast Oklahoma, the city has been called one of Americas most livable large cities by Partners for Livable Communities, Forbes, and Relocate America. FDi Magazine in 2009 ranked the city no.8 in the U. S. for cities of the future, in 2012, Tulsa was ranked among the top 50 best cities in the United States by BusinessWeek. People from Tulsa are called Tulsans, the area where Tulsa now exists was considered Indian Territory when it was first formally settled by the Lochapoka and Creek tribes in 1836. They established a settlement under the Creek Council Oak Tree at the present day intersection of Cheyenne Avenue. This area and this tree reminded Chief Tukabahchi and his group of trail of tear survivors of the bend in the river and their previous Creek Council Oak Tree back in the Talisi. They named their new settlement Tallasi, meaning old town in the Creek language, the area around Tulsa was also settled by members of the other so-called Five Civilized Tribes who had relocated to Oklahoma from the Southern United States. Most of modern Tulsa is located in the Creek Nation, with parts located in the Cherokee Nation, although Oklahoma was not yet a state during the Civil War, the Tulsa area did see its share of fighting. The Battle of Chusto-Talasah took place on the side of Tulsa. After the War, the tribes signed Reconstruction treaties with the government that in some cases required substantial land concessions. On January 18,1898, Tulsa was officially incorporated and elected its first mayor, Tulsa was a small town near the banks of the Arkansas River in 1901 when its first oil well, named Sue Bland No. Much of the oil was discovered on land whose mineral rights were owned by members of the Osage Nation under a system of headrights
21.
Muskogee, Oklahoma
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Muskogee is a city in and the county seat of Muskogee County, Oklahoma, United States. Home to Bacone College, it lies approximately 48 miles southeast of Tulsa, the population of the city was 39,223 as of the 2010 census, a 2.4 percent increase from 38,310 at the 2000 census, making it the eleventh-largest city in Oklahoma. The 1951 film Jim Thorpe, All American, starring Burt Lancaster, was filmed on the campus of Bacone Indian College at Muskogee, two feature films were recently shot in Muskogee, Salvation and Denizen. After the passage of the Indian Removal Act of 1830 under President Andrew Jackson and they were accompanied by their slaves to this area. The Indian Agency, a stone building, was built here in Muskogee. It was a site for meetings among the leaders of the Five Civilized Tribes, today it serves as a museum. At the top of what is known as Agency Hill, it is within Honor Heights Park on the west side of Muskogee, in 1872, the Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad was extended to the area. A federal court was established in Muskogee in 1889, around the time that Congress opened portions of Indian Territory to non-Native settlers via land rushes. The city was incorporated on March 19,1898, ohio native Charles N. Haskell moved to the city in March 1901. Haskell built the first five-story business block in Oklahoma Territory, he built, as Muskogee’s economic and business importance grew, so did its political power. In the years before the territory was admitted as a state and they met together August 21,1905 to propose the State of Sequoyah, to be controlled by Native Americans. They met in Muskogee to draft its constitution, planning to have Muskogee serve as the States capital, the proposal was vetoed by US President Theodore Roosevelt and mostly ignored by Congress, the proposed State of Sequoyah was never authorized. The US admitted the State of Oklahoma to the Union on November 16,1907 as the 46th State, Muskogee attracted national and international attention when, in May 2008, voters elected John Tyler Hammons as mayor. Nineteen years old at the time of his election, Hammons is among the youngest mayors in American history, Muskogee is an economic center for eastern Oklahoma and operates the Port of Muskogee on the Arkansas River, which is accessible from the Gulf of Mexico. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 38.8 square miles. Muskogee is near the confluence of the Arkansas River, Verdigris River and Grand River. It is served by U. S. Route 62, U. S. Route 64, U. S. Route 69, Oklahoma State Highway 16, Oklahoma State Highway 165, Oklahoma State Highway 351 and the Muskogee Turnpike. Muskogee lies in the Arkansas River Valley and has a low, the city is on the boundary of the oak and hickory forest region of eastern Oklahoma and the prairie, Great Plains region of northeastern Oklahoma
22.
Fort Smith, Arkansas
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Fort Smith is the second-largest city in Arkansas and one of the two county seats of Sebastian County. As of the 2010 Census, the population was 86,209, Fort Smith has a sister city relationship with Cisterna, Italy, site of the World War II Battle of Cisterna, fought by United States Army Rangers commanded by Fort Smith native William O. Darby. Fort Smith lies on the Arkansas-Oklahoma state border, situated at the junction of the Arkansas and Poteau Rivers, also known as Belle Point. The city began as a frontier military post in 1817 and would later become well known for its role in the settling of the Wild West. In 2007, Fort Smith was selected by the United States Department of the Interior to be the location of the new United States Marshals Service National Museum, the site that would later become Fort Smith became part of the United States in the Louisiana Purchase. Soon after, the Pike Expedition explored the Arkansas River, Fort Smith was founded in 1817 as a military post. A stockade was built and occupied, from 1817 until 1822, around the fort a small settlement began forming, but the Army abandoned the first Fort Smith in 1824 and moved 80 miles further west to Fort Gibson. Fort Smiths name comes from General Thomas Adams Smith, who commanded the United States Army Rifle Regiment in 1817, General Smith had ordered Army topographical engineer Stephen H. Long to find a suitable site on the Arkansas River for a fort. General Smith never visited the town or forts that bore his name, many displaced Native Americans settled in Fort Smith and Van Buren, while Sebastian county was formed in 1851, separated from Crawford County north of the Arkansas River. The fort was occupied by the Confederate Army during the years of the U. S. Civil War. Union troops under General Steele took control of Fort Smith on September 1,1863, a small fight occurred there on July 31,1864, but the Union army maintained command in the area until the war ended in 1865. The town became a haven for runaway slaves, orphans, Southern Unionists, federal troops abandoned the post of Fort Smith for the last time in 1871. The town continued to thrive despite the absence of federal troops, two of Fort Smiths most notable historic figures were Judge Isaac Parker and William Henry Harrison Clayton, sometimes referred to as W. H. H. In 1874, William Henry Harrison Clayton was appointed United States Attorney for the Western District of Arkansas by President Ulysses S. Grant, Fort Smith was a bustling community full of brothels, saloons and outlaws, just across the river from Indian Territory. William Clayton realized a strong judge would be necessary to bring law and he knew of a strong judge in Isaac Parker. But there was a problem, as Judge Parker had been appointed Chief Justice of Utah Territory, with the help of President Grant and US Senator Powell Clayton, former governor of Arkansas, William Clayton was able to undo that appointment and redirect Judge Parker to Fort Smith. Judge Isaac Parker served as U. S. District Judge 1875–1896, over the course of his career in Fort Smith, Parker sentenced 160 people to death. Of those,79 actually were executed on the gallows and his courthouse is now a National Historic Site where more men were put to death by the U. S. Government
23.
Pine Bluff, Arkansas
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Pine Bluff is the ninth largest city in the state of Arkansas. It is the county seat of Jefferson County, Arkansas and it is also the principal city of the Pine Bluff Metropolitan Statistical Area and part of the Little Rock-North Little Rock-Pine Bluff Combined Statistical Area. The population of the city was 49,083 in the 2010 Census, the city is situated in the Southeast section of the Arkansas Delta and straddles the Arkansas Timberlands region to its west. Its topography is flat with wide expanses of farmland consistent with other places in the Delta Lowlands, Pine Bluff is home to a number of creeks, streams, bayous, and larger bodies of water such as Lake Pine Bluff, Lake Langhofer and the Arkansas River. Pine Bluff is home to over three-quarters of the National Register of Historic Places listings in Jefferson County, the area along the Arkansas River had been inhabited for thousands of years by indigenous peoples of various cultures. They used the river for transportation like settlers after them, by the time of encounter with Europeans, the historical Quapaw were the chief people in the area, having migrated from the Ohio River valley centuries before. The city of Pine Bluff was founded by Europeans on a bank of the Arkansas River heavily forested with tall pine trees. The high ground furnished settlers a safe haven from annual flooding, Joseph Bonne, a Métis fur trader and trapper of mixed Quapaw and French ancestry, settled on this bluff in 1819. In 1829 Thomas Phillips claimed a section of land where Pine Bluff is located. Jefferson County was established by the Territorial Legislature on November 2,1829, at the August 13,1832 county election, the pine bluff was chosen as the county seat. The Quorum Court voted to name the village Pine Bluff Town on October 16,1832, Pine Bluff was incorporated January 8,1839, by the order of County Judge Taylor. At the time, the village had about 50 residents, improved transportation facilities aided in the growth of Pine Bluff during the 1840s and 1850s. With its proximity to the Arkansas River, the town served as a port for travel. Steamships provided the primary mode of transport, arriving from downriver ports such as New Orleans, from 1832-1858, Pine Bluff was also a station on the passage of Seminole and Black Seminoles who were forcibly removed from Florida to the Territory. They included the legendary John Horse, who landed in the city on the steamboat Swan in 1842. Pine Bluff was prospering by the outbreak of the Civil War with wealth built on the commodity crop of cotton, the city had one of the largest slave populations in the state by 1860 and Jefferson County, Arkansas was second in cotton production in the state. Union troops under Colonel Powell Clayton arrived September 17,1863, marmaduke tried to expel the Union Army in the Battle of Pine Bluff October 25,1863, but was repulsed by a combined effort of soldiers and freedmen. In the final year of the war, the 1st Regiment Kansas Volunteer Infantry, was the first African-American regiment in the war to go into combat
24.
Leadville, Colorado
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Leadville is the statutory city that is the county seat and only incorporated municipality in Lake County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 2,602 at the 2010 United States Census, situated at an elevation of 10,152 feet, Leadville is the highest incorporated city and the second highest incorporated municipality in the United States. In the late 19th century, Leadville was the second most populous city in Colorado, the Leadville area was first settled in 1859 when placer gold was discovered in California Gulch during the Pikes Peak Gold Rush. By 1860, a town, Oro City had sprung up, but the boom was brief because the placer-mined gold soon ran out and Oro City never became a major settlement. Prospectors traced the cerussite to its source, present day Leadville, Horace Tabor, who became known as the Leadville Silver King and his wife Augusta were among the first prospectors to arrive in Oro City. Tabor tried his luck at prospecting while his wife worked as a cook, laundress, banker. Leadville was founded in 1877 by mine owners Horace Tabor and August Meyer at the start of the Colorado Silver Boom, the town was built on desolate flat land below the tree line. The first miners lived in a tented camp near the silver deposits in California Gulch. Initially the settlement was called Slabtown but when the residents petitioned for a post office the name Leadville was chosen. By 1880 Tabor and Meyers new town had gas lighting, water mains and 28 miles of streets, five churches, many business buildings were constructed with bricks hauled in by wagons. The first post office was in Tabors store at Oro, Augusta Tabor was the postmistress, carriers went down to Denver one week and tried to come back the next. Postage was fifty cents a letter, in early 1878, Meyer, Harrison, Tabor established a post office in Leadville, with Henderson as postmaster. The post office and the telegraph office both prospered, the towns first newspaper was The Reveille, a Republican weekly in 1878. Three months later, a competing Democratic weekly, The Eclipse emerged, the Chronicle was the towns first daily and first newspaper in America to employ a full-time female reporter. Like the Rocky Mountain News, The Chronicle took the lead in outing criminals and thieves, despite violent threats, the Chronicle survived without major incident. William Nye opened the first saloon early 1877 and it was followed by many others, the same year The Coliseum Novelty was the first theater to open. It offered sleeping rooms upstairs for a rate and provided a variety of entertainments, dancing girls, dogfights, cockfighting, wrestling and boxing matches. In June 1881, it burned to the ground, ben Wood who arrived in Leadville in 1878, opened the first legitimate theatre, Woods Opera House with a thousand seats
25.
Rocky Mountains
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The Rocky Mountains, commonly known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range in western North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch more than 3,000 miles from the northernmost part of British Columbia, in western Canada, to New Mexico, in the Southwestern United States. Within the North American Cordillera, the Rockies are somewhat distinct from the Pacific Coast Ranges, the Rocky Mountains were initially formed from 80 million to 55 million years ago during the Laramide orogeny, in which a number of plates began to slide underneath the North American plate. The angle of subduction was shallow, resulting in a belt of mountains running down western North America. Since then, further tectonic activity and erosion by glaciers have sculpted the Rockies into dramatic peaks, at the end of the last ice age, humans started to inhabit the mountain range. The first mention of their present name by a European was in the journal of Jacques Legardeur de Saint-Pierre in 1752, the Rocky Mountains are commonly defined as stretching from the Liard River in British Columbia south to the Rio Grande in New Mexico. The United States definition of the Rockies includes the Cabinet and Salish Mountains of Idaho and their counterparts north of the Kootenai River, the Columbia Mountains, are considered a separate system in Canada, lying to the west of the huge Rocky Mountain Trench. This runs the length of British Columbia from its beginnings in the middle Flathead River valley in western Montana to the bank of the Liard River. The Rockies vary in width from 70 to 300 miles, also west of the Rocky Mountain Trench, farther north and facing the Muskwa Range across the trench, are the Stikine Ranges and Omineca Mountains of the Interior Mountains system of British Columbia. A small area east of Prince George, British Columbia on the side of the Trench. In Canada geographers define three main groups of ranges, the Continental Ranges, Hart Ranges and Muskwa Ranges, the Muskwa and Hart Ranges together comprise what is known as the Northern Rockies. The western edge of the Rockies includes ranges such as the Wasatch near Salt Lake City, the Great Basin and Columbia River Plateau separate these sub-ranges from distinct ranges further to the west, most prominent among which are the Sierra Nevada, Cascade Range and Coast Mountains. The Rocky Mountain System within the United States is a United States physiographic region, the Rocky Mountains are notable for containing the highest peaks in central North America. The ranges highest peak is Mount Elbert located in Colorado at 14,440 feet above sea level, Mount Robson in British Columbia, at 12,972 feet, is the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies. The Continental Divide of the Americas is located in the Rocky Mountains, triple Divide Peak in Glacier National Park is so named because water that falls on the mountain reaches not only the Atlantic and Pacific, but Hudson Bay as well. Farther north in Alberta, the Athabasca and other rivers feed the basin of the Mackenzie River, see Rivers of the Rocky Mountains for a list of rivers. Human population is not very dense in the Rocky Mountains, with an average of four people per square kilometer, however, the human population grew rapidly in the Rocky Mountain states between 1950 and 1990. The 40-year statewide increases in range from 35% in Montana to about 150% in Utah
26.
Desha County, Arkansas
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Desha County /dəˈʃeɪ/ is a county located in the southeast part of the U. S. state of Arkansas. As of the 2010 census, the population was 13,008, the county seat is Arkansas City. Located within the Arkansas Delta, Desha Countys rivers and fertile soils led to prosperity under the economy of plantation agriculture. Following mechanization on the farm, Desha County saw a demographic and economic transformation, the county was named for Captain Benjamin Desha, who fought in the War of 1812. According to the U. S. Census Bureau, the county has an area of 820 square miles. Desha County is within the Arkansas Delta and is considered a member of the Southeast Arkansas region, future Interstate 69 U. S. Highway 65 U. S. Highway 165 U. S. The population density was 20 people per square mile, there were 6,663 housing units at an average density of 9 per square mile. 3. 16% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race,26. 90% of all households were made up of individuals and 12. 70% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.57 and the family size was 3.10. In the county, the population was out with 28. 90% under the age of 18,9. 00% from 18 to 24,25. 20% from 25 to 44,22. 70% from 45 to 64. The median age was 36 years, for every 100 females there were 87.60 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 82.90 males, the median income for a household in the county was $24,121, and the median income for a family was $30,028. Males had an income of $29,623 versus $18,913 for females. The per capita income for the county was $13,446, about 23. 60% of families and 28. 90% of the population were below the poverty line, including 39. 60% of those under age 18 and 24. 00% of those age 65 or over. Dumas McGehee Mitchellville Watson Arkansas City Reed Tillar Back Gate Halley Kelso Pea Ridge Pickens Rohwer Snow Lake Napoleon Townships in Arkansas are the divisions of a county, each township includes unincorporated areas, some may have incorporated cities or towns within part of their boundaries. Arkansas townships have limited purposes in modern times, however, the United States Census does list Arkansas population based on townships. Townships are also of value for purposes in terms of genealogical research. Each town or city is one or more townships in an Arkansas county based on census maps
27.
Napoleon, Arkansas
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Napoleon is a ghost town in Desha County, Arkansas, near the confluence of the Arkansas and Mississippi rivers. Once the county seat, Napoleon was flooded in 1874 when the banks of the Mississippi River burst through, in 1852, Bolivar County, Mississippi, established Wellington as its county seat, nearly opposite Napoleon, on the east bank of the Mississippi River. North of Napoleon, the followed a sharp curve east into Mississippi along what was then called Beulah Bend. During the American Civil War, Confederate soldiers would move east by foot from Napoleon, hide in an area near the bend. The bend was so tight that the cannon could be used on ships as they entered. Following one such ambush in 1863, a Federal gunship led by William Tecumseh Sherman landed at Wellington, seeking to permanently avoid the ambush point at Beulah Bend, Union commander Thomas Oliver Selfridge ordered a channel dug across the peninsula around which Beulah Bend flowed. The soft land and strong river current enabled the Napoleon Channel to be cut in just a day, the Napoleon Channel improved the Mississippi River for shipping, as it removed 10 mi from the navigable route. Unfortunately, the river currents caused by the Napoleon Channel caused both Wellington and Napoleon to be completely submerged within a few years. The town was the subject of a chapter in Mark Twains Life on the Mississippi, twain says he learned of the moneys being hidden but, when he tried to retrieve it, discovered the entire town has been washed away in earlier floods. Twain reports that the early explorers De Soto, Marquette and Joliet, list of ghost towns in Arkansas Historic maps of Mississippi River Photos of Napoleon from 2009
28.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
29.
Dardanelle, Arkansas
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Dardanelle is a city in Yell County, Arkansas, United States. The population was 4,745 at the 2010 census, along with Danville, it serves as a county seat for Yell County. It is located near Lake Dardanelle, Dardanelle is part of the Russellville Micropolitan Statistical Area. Dardanelle is one of the oldest cities in the state of Arkansas, officially incorporated in 1855, Dardanelle celebrated its 150th anniversary in 2005. However, the area had settled for years before that. It is Yell Countys dual county seat, sharing that title with Danville, the Treaty of Council Oaks was signed on June 24,1823 on what is now Front Street beneath two huge oak trees. As a result of the treaty, the Cherokees gave up all of their land in Arkansas south of the Arkansas River, one of the trees was destroyed in the early 1990s in a flood, but the other is still standing. The site is now a city park, because of its location on the banks of the Arkansas River, Dardanelle was one of Arkansass leading towns in the 19th century. Hundreds of barges, steamboats, and other vessels traveled by the town annually, approximately halfway between the states two largest cities of Little Rock and Fort Smith, Dardanelle was a transportation and business hub, known as a marketplace for gin, rum and cotton. Dardanelle has a history of being one of the leading immigration centers that continues to this day. Vast numbers of Czech and German families, including the Ballouns, Vodrazkas, Staneks, and Pfeiffers, came to the town in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, and their impact can still be felt. As of 2010, Dardanelle has one of the highest percentages of Hispanics in the state, merritt Park opened in the late 1990s on the west side of town. It is a large, state-of-the-art park featuring outstanding baseball facilities, a playground, soccer fields, basketball courts, the adjacent Dardanelle Community Center opened around the same time, and provides multiple services for the community. In the late 19th century, a bridge between Dardanelle and Russellville replaced ferry service. Spanning 2,208 feet, it was the longest pontoon bridge constructed across a moving body of water. The bridge was washed out multiple times during its nearly forty years of existence. The Dardanelle Lock & Dam, constructed in the 1960s as a part of the McClellan-Kerr Navigation System and it is a source of hydropower, and helps regulate river traffic on the Arkansas River. For 2013, over 8.9 million dollars were budgeted for its operations, Dardanelle is located at 35°13′21″N 93°9′37″W
30.
River mile
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In the United States, a river mile is a measure of distance in miles along a river from its mouth. River mile numbers begin at zero and increase further upstream, the corresponding metric unit using kilometers is the river kilometer. They are analogous to vehicle roadway mile markers, except that river miles are marked on the physical river, instead they are marked on navigation charts. Riverfront properties are sometimes partially legally described by their river mile, River mile zero may not be exactly at the mouth. For example, the Willamette River has its river mile zero at the edge of the channel in the Columbia. Also, the mile zero for the Lower Mississippi River is located at Head of Passes. Mileages are indicated as AHP or BHP, River miles are used in a variety of ways. Some islands are named for their river mile distance, for example the Allegheny River in Pennsylvania has Six Mile Island, Nine Mile Island, Twelve Mile Island, and Fourteen Mile Island. The state of Ohio uses the River Mile System of Ohio and this work began by hand measurements on paper maps between 1972 and 1975 and has since been converted to a computer-based electronic version, which now covers the state in 787 river mile maps. Locations of facilities such as wastewater treatment plants and water quality measurement sites are referenced via river miles, Ohio uses one of two systems. The simplest is just the name of the river and the location in river miles, the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers uses river miles for its navigation maps. Waterway Mile Marker Database Delaware River Mileage System
31.
Tributary
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A tributary or affluent is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean, tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drainage basin of its surface water and groundwater, leading the water out into an ocean. A confluence, where two or more bodies of water together, usually refers to the joining of tributaries. The opposite to a tributary is a distributary, a river or stream that branches off from, distributaries are most often found in river deltas. Right tributary and left tributary are terms stating the orientation of the relative to the flow of the main stem river. These terms are defined from the perspective of looking downstream, where tributaries have the same name as the river into which they feed, they are called forks. These are typically designated by compass direction, for example, the American River receives flow from its North, Middle, and South forks. The Chicago Rivers North Branch has the East, West, and Middle Fork, the South Branch has its South Fork, forks are sometimes designated as right or left. Here, the handedness is from the point of view of an observer facing upstream, for instance, Steer Creek has a left tributary which is called Right Fork Steer Creek. Tributaries are sometimes listed starting with those nearest to the source of the river, the Strahler Stream Order examines the arrangement of tributaries in a hierarchy of first, second, third, and higher orders, with the first-order tributary being typically the least in size. For example, a second-order tributary would be the result of two or more first-order tributaries combining to form the second-order tributary, another method is to list tributaries from mouth to source, in the form of a tree structure, stored as a tree data structure
32.
Western United States
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The Western United States, commonly referred to as the American West, the Far West, or simply the West, traditionally refers to the region comprising the westernmost states of the United States. Because European settlement in the U. S. expanded westward after its founding, prior to about 1800, the crest of the Appalachian Mountains was seen as the western frontier. Since then, the frontier moved westward and eventually lands west of the Mississippi River came to be referred to as the West. The West contains several major biomes, the Western U. S. is the largest region of the country, covering more than half the land area of the United States. Given this expansive and diverse geography it is no wonder the region is difficult to specifically define, a majority of the historian respondents placed the eastern boundary of the West east of the Census definition out on the eastern edge of the Great Plains or on the Mississippi River. The survey respondents as a whole showed just how little agreement there was on the boundaries of the West, within a region as large and diverse as the Western United States, smaller areas with more closely shared demographics and geography have developed as subregions. Meanwhile, the states of Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington can be considered part of the Northwest or Pacific Northwest, West Texas in the Chihuahuan Desert may be considered as part of the Western U. S. Fort Worth has long laid claim to be Where the West Begins, the West is still one of the most sparsely settled areas in the United States with 49.5 inhabitants per square mile. Only Texas with 78.0 inhabitants/sq mi, Washington with 86.0 inhabitants/sq mi. and California with 213.4 inhabitants/sq mi. exceed the national average of 77.98 inhabitants/sq mi. The entire Western region has also strongly influenced by European, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Native Americans. African and European Americans, however, continue to wield a stronger political influence because of the rates of citizenship and voting among Asians. The West also contains much of the Native American population in the U. S. particularly in the reservations in the Mountain. The Western United States has a sex ratio than any other region in the United States. Because the tide of development had not yet reached most of the West when conservation became an issue, agencies of the federal government own. National parks are reserved for activities such as fishing, camping, hiking, and boating, but other government lands also allow commercial activities like ranching, logging. The largest city in the region is Los Angeles, located on the West Coast, Other West Coast cities include San Diego, San Bernardino, San Jose, San Francisco, Oakland, Bakersfield, Sacramento, Seattle, Tacoma, and Portland. Prominent cities in the Mountain States include Denver, Colorado Springs, Phoenix, Tucson, Albuquerque, Las Vegas, Salt Lake City, Boise, El Paso, and Cheyenne. Along the Pacific Ocean coast lie the Coast Ranges, which and they collect a large part of the airborne moisture moving in from the ocean
33.
Arkansas River Valley
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The Arkansas River Valley is a region in Arkansas defined by the Arkansas River in the western part of the state. The Arkansas River Valley is not formally defined along county boundaries, including all of Logan and Sebastian counties and portions of Conway, Franklin, Perry, Pope, and Yell counties. Most first encounters describe scattered villages and individual farmsteads in the River Valley, unlike the organized towns and groves and orchards encountered in eastern Arkansas. Research at the site has linked artifacts to cave art in a cave on Petit Jean Mountain, as well as establishing links to the Caddo, Osage, hernando de Soto became the first European explorer to enter Arkansas in 1541. His expedition of 600 Spanish explorers searching for gold and riches crossed into Arkansas across the Mississippi River, the expedition traveled to Tanico, an important city somewhere in the River Valley, in September 1542. The following month, the expedition fought with a tribe referred to as the Tula somewhere near Fort Smith and this fighting apparently caused de Soto to turn the expedition back east, leaving the River Valley. Following the war, the Southern economy was in shambles, including Arkansas, the cost of the war effort, loss of human capital, and Confederate currency losing value were serious issues for the South in addition to the destruction of property, infrastructure, and crops. Many parts of Arkansas had descended into lawlessness and violence between whitecapping groups, freedmen, Republicans, and unaffiliated bandits taking advantage of the chaos, indicative of the disarray, Radical Republican Governor Powell Clayton declared martial law in ten counties following reelection in 1868. Although no River Valley counties were subject to the proclamation, Clayton later added four more counties, including one partial-River Valley county. The Klan had limited support, and much of the area was viewed steadily Republican, due to its relatively strong position following the Civil War, the River Valley attracted new settlement throughout Reconstruction. Populations of Austrian Catholics, German Catholics, and German Catholics, some immigrated directly from Europe, but most came from early settlements in the Ohio River Valley. The Lutherans generally immigrated in organized companies, where the Catholics came independently, although some Catholic settlements like Clarksville and these settlements received support from existing immigrant populations in Little Rock and Fort Smith, and groups of Protestant settlers also establishing settlements in the area. Several of the River Valleys small towns were founded by groups, beginning as small clusters of immigrants. Upon arriving in the region, many found only densely forested upland to be the property they could afford. River Valley soil and climate are much less conducive to cultivation than the Arkansas Delta. Eventually, a preference for mixed farming emerged, including potatoes and other garden vegetables, Coal mining was an important industry in the River Valleys early history. Dangerous and demanding, the industry attracted Swiss and German immigrants who were unable to establish productive farms, mining became prominent by 1873, especially around the Altus area. The Swiss and German immigrants found the rolling hills similar to the topography of their homeland, due to the climate, fertile soil and immigrants accustomed to wine with their meals, several wineries were established in the River Valley
34.
Snowpack
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Snowpack forms from layers of snow that accumulate in geographic regions and high altitudes where the climate includes cold weather for extended periods during the year. Snowpacks are an important water resource that feed streams and rivers as they melt, therefore, snowpacks are both the drinking water source for many communities and a potential source of flooding. Snowpacks also contribute mass to glaciers in their accumulation zone, assessing the formation and stability of snowpacks is important in the study and prediction of avalanches. Snow is also studied in a global context of impact on animal habitats. An important effort is put into snow classification, both as an hydrometeor and on the ground, snowpack modeling is done for snow stability, flood forecasting, water resource management, and climate studies. Snowpack modeling is either done by simple, statistical methods such as day or complex, physically based energy balance models such as the SNOWPACK model. Advection Glaciation Glacier mass balance Hydrology Subnivean climate SNOWPACK CROCUS SnowModel
35.
Sawatch Range
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The range is oriented along a northwest-southeast axis, extending approximately 80 miles from 39°37′36″N 106°32′13″W in the north to 38°5′51″N 106°3′48″W in the south. The range contains 15 peaks topping 14,000 feet, also known as 14ers, the range forms a portion of the Continental Divide, and its eastern flanks are drained by the headwaters of the Arkansas River. The western side of the feeds the headwaters of the Roaring Fork River, the Eagle River. The Sawatch mountains in general are high, massive, and relatively gentle in contour, while some peaks are rugged enough to require technical climbing, most can be climbed by a simple, yet arduous hike. Notable summits include Mount Elbert, Mount Massive, La Plata Peak, Mount of the Holy Cross, state Highway 82 traverses the range at Independence Pass. It is also traversed by Cottonwood Pass, which connects the town of Buena Vista with Gunnison County. Both Independence Pass and Cottonwood Pass are over 12,000 feet, hagerman Pass is another pass to the north, connecting the Arkansas Headwaters near Leadville with the upper valley of the Fryingpan River. Hagerman pass is traversable with four-wheel drive vehicles and on foot during summer, the range contains numerous hiking trails within the San Isabel National Forest and White River National Forest. Southern Rocky Mountains Mountain ranges of Colorado Collegiate Peaks Sawatch Range @ Peakbagger Sawatch Range @ 14ers. com Sawatch Range @ summitpost. org Mt. Aetna @ summitpost. org
36.
Mosquito Range
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The Mosquito Range is a high mountain range in the Rocky Mountains of central Colorado in the United States. The peaks of the form a ridge running north-south for approximately 40 miles from southern Summit County on the north end. The ranges forms a barrier separating the headwaters of the Arkansas River near Leadville from South Park. The highest peak in the range is Mount Lincoln at an elevation of 14,286 ft, other fourteeners in the range are Mount Bross, Mount Democrat, and Mount Sherman. The mountains are faulted anticlines formed as part of the Sawatch Uplift during the Laramide orogeny approximately 65 MYA, the range is primarily of granite. The eastern flank of the range along the rim of South Park overlain by Paleozoic and Mesozoic sedimentary rocks, the northern end of the range was glaciated during Pleistocene time, forming u-shaped valleys in the canyons. The high ridge of the forms a relatively difficult barrier between South Park and the Arkansas headwaters. Several of the peaks of the range are prominently visible from the southern side of Fremont Pass along State Highway 91 between Climax and Leadville. The range is not traversed by any major highway, but only in two places by backroads over high passes, Mosquito Pass and Weston Pass, much of the range is located within the Pike National Forest. Southern Rocky Mountains Tenmile Range Mountain ranges of Colorado Mosquito Range @ Peakbagger
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Midwestern United States
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It was officially named the North Central region by the Census Bureau until 1984. Illinois is the most populous of the states and North Dakota the least, a 2012 report from the United States Census put the population of the Midwest at 65,377,684. The Midwest is divided by the Census Bureau into two divisions, the East North Central Division includes Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin, all of which are also part of the Great Lakes region. Major rivers in the include, from east to west, the Ohio River, the Upper Mississippi River. Chicago is the most populated city in the American Midwest and the third most populous in the entire country, other large Midwest cities include, Indianapolis, Columbus, Detroit, Milwaukee, Kansas City, Omaha, Minneapolis, Cleveland, Wichita and St. Louis. Chicago and its suburbs form the largest metropolitan area with 9.8 million people, followed by Metro Detroit. Paul, Greater St. Louis, Greater Cleveland, Greater Cincinnati, Kansas City metro area, the term Midwestern has been in use since the 1880s to refer to portions of the central United States. A variant term, Middle West, has used since the 19th century. Another term sometimes applied to the general region is the heartland. Other designations for the region have fallen out of use, such as the Northwest or Old Northwest, the Northwest Territory was one of the earliest territories of the United States, stretching northwest from the Ohio River to northern Minnesota and upper-Mississippi. The upper-Mississippi watershed including the Missouri and Illinois Rivers was the setting for the earlier French settlements of the Illinois Country, economically the region is balanced between heavy industry and agriculture, with finance and services such as medicine and education becoming increasingly important. Its central location makes it a crossroads for river boats, railroads, autos, trucks. Politically the region swings back and forth between the parties, and thus is heavily contested and often decisive in elections, after the sociological study Middletown, which was based on Muncie, Indiana, commentators used Midwestern cities as typical of the nation. The region has a higher ratio than the Northeast, the West. Traditional definitions of the Midwest include the Northwest Ordinance Old Northwest states, the states of the Old Northwest are also known as Great Lakes states and are east-north central in the United States. The Ohio River runs along the section while the Mississippi River runs north to south near the center. Many of the Louisiana Purchase states in the west-north central United States, are known as Great Plains states. The Midwest lies north of the 36°30′ parallel that the 1820 Missouri Compromise established as the line between future slave and non-slave states
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Southern United States
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The Southern United States, commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South, is a region of the United States of America. The South does not fully match the geographic south of the United States, arizona and New Mexico, which are geographically in the southern part of the country, are rarely considered part, while West Virginia, which separated from Virginia in 1863, commonly is. Some scholars have proposed definitions of the South that do not coincide neatly with state boundaries, while the states of Delaware and Maryland, as well as the District of Columbia permitted slavery prior to the start of the Civil War, they remained with the Union. However, the United States Census Bureau puts them in the South, usually, the South is defined as including the southeastern and south-central United States. The region is known for its culture and history, having developed its own customs, musical styles, and cuisines, the Southern ethnic heritage is diverse and includes strong European, African, and some Native American components. Since the late 1960s, black people have many offices in Southern states, especially in the coastal states of Virginia. Historically, the South relied heavily on agriculture, and was rural until after 1945. It has since become more industrialized and urban and has attracted national and international migrants, the American South is now among the fastest-growing areas in the United States. Houston is the largest city in the Southern United States, sociological research indicates that Southern collective identity stems from political, demographic, and cultural distinctiveness from the rest of the United States. The region contains almost all of the Bible Belt, an area of high Protestant church attendance and predominantly conservative, indeed, studies have shown that Southerners are more conservative than non-Southerners in several areas, including religion, morality, international relations and race relations. Apart from its climate, the experience in the South increasingly resembles the rest of the nation. The arrival of millions of Northerners and millions of Hispanics meant the introduction of cultural values, the process has worked both ways, however, with aspects of Southern culture spreading throughout a greater portion of the rest of the United States in a process termed Southernization. The question of how to define the subregions in the South has been the focus of research for nearly a century, as defined by the United States Census Bureau, the Southern region of the United States includes sixteen states. As of 2010, an estimated 114,555,744 people, or thirty-seven percent of all U. S. residents, lived in the South, the nations most populous region. Other terms related to the South include, The Old South, the New South, usually including the South Atlantic States. The Solid South, region largely controlled by the Democratic Party from 1877 to 1964, before that, blacks were elected to national office and many to local office through the 1880s, Populist-Republican coalitions gained victories for Fusionist candidates for governors in the 1890s. Includes at least all the 11 former Confederate States, Southeastern United States, usually including the Carolinas, the Virginias, Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and Florida. The Deep South, various definitions, usually including Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, occasionally, parts of adjoining states are included
39.
Missouri River
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The Missouri River is the longest river in North America. Rising in the Rocky Mountains of western Montana, the Missouri flows east and south for 2,341 miles before entering the Mississippi River north of St. Louis, Missouri. The river takes drainage from a populated, semi-arid watershed of more than half a million square miles. When combined with the lower Mississippi River, it forms the fourth longest river system. For over 12,000 years, people have depended on the Missouri River and its tributaries as a source of sustenance and transportation. More than ten major groups of Native Americans populated the watershed, most leading a nomadic lifestyle, the Missouri River was one of the main routes for the westward expansion of the United States during the 19th century. The growth of the fur trade in the early 1800s laid much of the groundwork as trappers explored the region, pioneers headed west en masse beginning in the 1830s, first by covered wagon, then by the growing numbers of steamboats entering service on the river. Former Native American lands in the watershed were taken over by settlers, leading to some of the most longstanding, during the 20th century, the Missouri River basin was extensively developed for irrigation, flood control and the generation of hydroelectric power. Fifteen dams impound the main stem of the river, with more on tributaries. Meanders have been cut and the river channelized to improve navigation, from the Rocky Mountains of Montana and Wyoming, three streams rise to form the headwaters of the Missouri River. The longest begins near Browers Spring,9,100 feet above sea level, on the southeastern slopes of Mount Jefferson in the Centennial Mountains. Flowing west then north, it runs first in Hell Roaring Creek, then west into the Red Rock, swings northeast to become the Beaverhead and these two streams then flow north and northwest into Montana. The Missouri River officially starts at the confluence of the Jefferson and Madison in Missouri Headwaters State Park near Three Forks, Montana, the Missouri then passes through Canyon Ferry Lake, a reservoir west of the Big Belt Mountains. Issuing from the mountains near Cascade, the flows northeast to the city of Great Falls, where it drops over the Great Falls of the Missouri. Farther on, the passes through the Fort Peck Dam, and immediately downstream. At the confluence, the Yellowstone is actually the larger river, the Missouri then meanders east past Williston and into Lake Sakakawea, the reservoir formed by Garrison Dam. Below the dam the Missouri receives the Knife River from the west and flows south to Bismarck, the capital of North Dakota and it slows into the Lake Oahe reservoir just before the Cannonball River confluence. While it continues south, eventually reaching Oahe Dam in South Dakota, the Missouri makes a bend to the southeast as it winds through the Great Plains, receiving the Niobrara River and many smaller tributaries from the southwest
40.
Lake County, Colorado
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Lake County is one of the 64 counties in the U. S. state of Colorado. As of the 2010 census, the population was 7,310, the county seat and the only municipality in the county is Leadville. The highest natural point in Colorado and the entire Rocky Mountains is the summit of Mount Elbert in Lake County at 14,440 feet elevation, Lake County was one of the original 17 counties created by the Colorado legislature on November 1,1861. As originally defined, Lake County included a portion of western Colorado to the south. The county was named for Twin Lakes, placer gold was found at Colorado Gulch in 1863 as part of the Colorado Gold Rush. With its many reductions in size, Lake Countys designated county seat also changed multiple times within just a few years, residing successively in Oro City, Lourette, Dayton, by 1878, Lake County had been reduced to an area including only present-day Lake and Chaffee counties. According to the U. S. Census Bureau, the county has an area of 384 square miles. It is the fourth-smallest county in Colorado by area, outlast is set in a fictional asylum in Lake County. The population density was 21 people per square mile, there were 3,913 housing units at an average density of 10 per square mile. 36. 14% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race,26. 30% of all households were made up of individuals and 5. 60% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.59 and the family size was 3.15. In the county, the population was out with 26. 90% under the age of 18,12. 80% from 18 to 24,33. 10% from 25 to 44,20. 60% from 45 to 64. The median age was 30 years, for every 100 females there were 115.80 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 116.70 males, the median income for a household in the county was $37,691, and the median income for a family was $41,652. Males had an income of $30,977 versus $24,415 for females. The per capita income for the county was $18,524, about 9. 50% of families and 12. 90% of the population were below the poverty line, including 15. 60% of those under age 18 and 6. 30% of those age 65 or over
41.
Placer mining
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Placer mining is the mining of stream bed deposits for minerals. This may be done by open-pit or by various surface excavating equipment or tunnelling equipment, the metal or gemstones, having been moved by stream flow from an original source such as a vein, are typically only a minuscule portion of the total deposit. Since gems and heavy metals like gold are more dense than sand. The containing material may be too loose to safely mine by tunnelling, where water under pressure is available, it may be used to mine, move, and separate the precious material from the deposit, a method known as hydraulic mining, hydraulic sluicing or hydraulicking. The word placer derives from the Spanish placer, meaning shoal or alluvial/sand deposit, from Catalan placer, from plassa, from Medieval Latin placea the origin word for place and plaza in English. The word in Spanish is thus derived from placea and refers directly to an alluvial or glacial deposit of sand or gravel. Placers supplied most of the gold for a part of the ancient world. Hydraulic mining methods such as hushing were used widely by the Romans across their empire, one of the largest sites was at Las Médulas, where seven 30 mile long aqueducts were used to work the alluvial gold deposits through the first century AD. Placer mining continues in many areas of the world as a source of diamonds, industrial minerals and metals, gems, platinum, an area well protected from the flow of water is a great location to find gold. Gold is very dense and is found in a stream bed. Many different gold deposits are dealt with in different ways, placer deposits attract many prospectors because their costs are very low. There are many different places gold could be placed, such as a residual, alluvial, residual deposits are more common where there has been weathering on rocks and where there hasn’t been water. They are deposits which have not been washed away yet or been moved, the residual usually lies at the site of the lode. This type of deposit undergoes rock weathering, alluvial or eluvial deposits sometimes have the largest gold deposit and are very common. This deposit is created when a force of nature moves or washes the gold away and it contains pieces of ore that have been washed away from the lode. Alluvial deposits are the most common type of placer gold and this type of deposit occurs mostly in valleys. Bench deposits are created when gold reaches a stream bed, gold accumulations in an old stream bed that are high are called bench deposits. They can be found on slopes that drain into valleys
42.
Ohio River
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The Ohio River, which streams westward from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to Cairo, Illinois, is the largest tributary, by volume, of the Mississippi River in the United States. The 981-mile river flows through or along the border of six states, through its largest tributary, the Tennessee River, the basin includes many of the states of the southeastern U. S. It is the source of drinking water for three million people and it is named in Iroquoian or Seneca, Ohi, yó, lit. Good River or Shawnee, Pelewathiipi and Spelewathiipi, the river had great significance in the history of the Native Americans, as numerous civilizations formed along its valley. For thousands of years, Native Americans used the river as a major transportation, in 1669, René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle led a French expedition to the Ohio River, becoming the first Europeans to see it. After European-American settlement, the served as a border between present-day Kentucky and Indian Territories. It was a transportation route for pioneers during the westward expansion of the early U. S. In his Notes on the State of Virginia published in 1781–82, Thomas Jefferson stated and its current gentle, waters clear, and bosom smooth and unbroken by rocks and rapids, a single instance only excepted. During the 19th century, the river was the boundary of the Northwest Territory. Where the river was narrow, it was the way to freedom for thousands of slaves escaping to the North, many helped by free blacks and whites of the Underground Railroad resistance movement. The Ohio River is a transition area, as its water runs along the periphery of the humid subtropical. It is inhabited by fauna and flora of both climates, in winter, it regularly freezes over at Pittsburgh but rarely further south toward Cincinnati and Louisville. At Paducah, Kentucky, in the south, near the Ohios confluence with the Mississippi, Paducah was founded there because it is the northernmost ice-free reach of the Ohio. The Ohio River is formed by the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers at Point State Park in Pittsburgh, from there, it flows northwest through Allegheny and Beaver counties, before making an abrupt turn to the south-southwest at the West Virginia–Ohio–Pennsylvania triple-state line. From there, it forms the border between West Virginia and Ohio, upstream of Wheeling, West Virginia, the river then follows a roughly southwest and then west-northwest course until Cincinnati, before bending to a west-southwest course for most of its length. The course forms the borders of West Virginia and Kentucky. The Ohio drains parts of 15 states in four regions, northeast New York, a small area of the southern border along the headwaters of the Allegheny. Pennsylvania, a corridor from the corner to north central border
43.
100th meridian west
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The 100th meridian west forms a great circle with the 80th meridian east. Dodge City, Kansas lies exactly at the intersection of the Arkansas River, the type of agriculture west of the meridian typically relies heavily on irrigation. Historically the meridian has often taken as a rough boundary between the eastern and western United States. White settlement, spreading westward after the American Civil War, settled the area around this meridian during the 1870s, wallace Stegners Beyond the Hundredth Meridian, is a biography of John Wesley Powell, an explorer of the American West. The song At the Hundredth Meridian by The Tragically Hip is about the 100th meridian west, specifically in Canada, 99th meridian west 101st meridian west Rain follows the plow
44.
Texas annexation
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The Texas annexation was the 1845 incorporation of the Republic of Texas into the United States of America, which was admitted to the Union as the 28th state on December 29,1845. The Republic of Texas declared independence from the Republic of Mexico on March 2,1836, at the time the vast majority of the Texian population favored the annexation of the Republic by the United States. Moreover, they wished to avoid a war with Mexico, whose government refused to acknowledge the sovereignty of its rebellious northern province. His official motivation was to outmaneuver suspected diplomatic efforts by the British government for emancipation of slaves in Texas, through secret negotiations with the Houston administration, Tyler secured a treaty of annexation in April 1844. Pro-Texas-annexation southern Democratic delegates denied their anti-annexation leader Martin Van Buren the nomination at their partys convention in May 1844, in alliance with pro-expansion northern Democratic colleagues, they secured the nomination of James K. Polk, who ran on a pro-Texas Manifest Destiny platform. In June 1844, the Senate, with its Whig majority, the pro-annexation Democrat Polk narrowly defeated anti-annexation Whig Henry Clay in the November 1844 presidential election. In December 1844, lame-duck President Tyler called on Congress to pass his treaty by simple majorities in each house, the Democratic-dominated House of Representatives complied with his request by passing an amended bill expanding on the pro-slavery provisions of the Tyler treaty. On March 1,1845, President Tyler signed the annexation bill, when Polk took office the next day, he encouraged Texas to accept the Tyler offer. Texas ratified the agreement with popular approval from Texans, the bill was signed by Polk on December 29,1845, accepting Texas as the 28th state of the Union. Texas formally relinquished its sovereignty to the United States on February 19,1846, first mapped by Spain in 1519, Texas was part of the vast Spanish empire seized by the Spanish Conquistadors from its indigenous people for over 300 years. When the Louisiana territory was acquired by the United States from France in 1803, the boundaries of Texas were determined within the larger geostrategic struggle to demarcate the limits of the United States extensive western lands and of Spains vast possessions in North America. Nonetheless, Texas remained an object of fervent interest to American expansionists, among them Thomas Jefferson, while a majority of southern congressmen acquiesced to the exclusion of slavery from the bulk of the Louisiana Purchase, a significant minority objected. Then-Representative John Tyler of Virginia invoked the Jeffersonian precepts of territorial and commercial growth as a goal to counter the rise of sectional differences over slavery. This doctrine would be revived during the Texas annexation controversy, colonizing empresario Stephen F. Austin managed the regional affairs of the mostly American-born population – 20% of them slaves – under the terms of the generous government land grants. A general lawlessness prevailed in the vast Texas frontier, and Mexicos civic laws went largely unenforced, Mexican authorities, perceiving that they were losing control over Texas and alarmed by the unsuccessful Fredonian Rebellion of 1826, abandoned the policy of benign rule. New restrictions were imposed in 1829–1830, outlawing slavery throughout the nation, military occupation followed, sparking local uprisings and a civil war. Texas conventions in 1832 and 1833 submitted petitions for redress of grievances to overturn the restrictions, in 1835, an army under Mexican President Santa Anna entered its territory of Texas and abolished self-government. Texans responded by declaring their independence from Mexico on March 2,1836, on April 20–21, rebel forces under Texas General Sam Houston defeated the Mexican army at the Battle of San Jacinto
45.
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
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With the defeat of its army and the fall of its capital, Mexico entered into negotiations to end the war. The treaty called for the U. S. to pay $15 million to Mexico, Mexicans in those annexed areas had the choice of relocating to within Mexicos new boundaries or receiving American citizenship with full civil rights. Over 90% chose to become U. S. citizens, the U. S. Senate advised and consented to ratification of the treaty by a vote of 38–14. The opponents of this treaty were led by the Whigs, who had opposed the war and rejected Manifest destiny in general, and rejected this expansion in particular. The peace talks were negotiated by Nicholas Trist, chief clerk of the US State Department, Nicholas Trist negotiated with a special commission representing the collapsed government led by Don José Bernardo Couto, Don Miguel de Atristain, and Don Luis Gonzaga Cuevas of Mexico. Instead, Article V of the treaty simply described the new U. S. –Mexico border. Comparing the boundary in the Adams–Onís Treaty to the Guadalupe Hidalgo boundary, Mexico conceded about 55% of its pre-war, pre-Texas territorial claims, articles VIII and IX ensured safety of existing property rights of Mexican citizens living in the transferred territories. Despite assurances to the contrary, the property rights of Mexican citizens were not honored by the U. S. in accordance with modifications to. The U. S. also agreed to assume $3.25 million in debts that Mexico owed to United States citizens, the residents had one year to choose whether they wanted American or Mexican citizenship, Over 90% chose American citizenship, which included full voting rights. The others returned to Mexico, or in cases in New Mexico were allowed to remain in place as Mexican citizens. Article XII engaged the United States to pay, In consideration of the acquired,15 million dollars. Article XI of the treaty was important to Mexico. S, would return captives of the Indians to Mexico. Mexicans believed that the United States had encouraged and assisted the Comanche and Apache raids that had devastated northern Mexico in the years before the war and this article promised relief to them Article XI, however, proved unenforceable. Destructive Indian raids continued despite a heavy U. S. presence near the Mexican border, Mexico filed 366 claims with the U. S. government for damages done by Comanche and Apache raids between 1848 and 1853. In 1853, in the Treaty of Mesilla concluding the Gadsden Purchase, the remainder of New Mexico and Arizona were peacefully purchased under the Gadsden Purchase, which was carried out in 1853. In this purchase the United States paid an additional $10 million, however, the American Civil War delayed construction of such a route, and it was not until 1881 that the Southern Pacific Railroad finally was completed, fulfilling the purpose of the acquisition. Mexico had claimed the area in question since winning its independence from the Spanish Empire in 1821 following the Mexican War of Independence. About 80,000 Mexicans lived in the areas of California, New Mexico, Arizona, and Texas during the period of 1845 to 1850, and far fewer in Nevada, in southern and western Colorado, and in Utah
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"Arkansas, a river of the United States of America". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
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