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Howder Travel Adventures: United States Counties that I have Visited

1,056 Counties Visited = 33.6% of Counties in the United States

Source of underlying map: Wikimedia Commons under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.

On August 14, 2002, I crossed the Red River of the North on Interstate 94 to enter Fargo, North Dakota. Concurrently I arrived at my 50th and final state in the United States. With that goal successfully attained I decided to focus on the next level down: the counties and county-equivalents. I thought I'd done pretty well until I plotted it on a map and demonstrated to myself how little of the country I'd actually seen. These results are paltry compared to some people's county "life lists" that I have seen, but it's at least a start. Progress by State State Total Counties Counties Visited Percent Visited Alabama 67 23 34.3% Alaska 29 7 24.1% Arizona 15 9 60.0% Arkansas 75 1 1.3% California 58 24 41.4% Colorado 64 18 28.1% Connecticut 8 7 87.5% Delaware 3 3 100.0% Florida 67 24 35.8% Georgia 159 37 23.3% Hawaii 5 2 40.0% Idaho 44 3 6.8% Illinois 102 40 39.2% Indiana 92 28 30.4% Iowa 99 30 30.3% Kansas 105 10 8.6% Kentucky 120 36 30.0% Louisiana 64 26 40.6% Maine 16 13 81.3% Maryland 24 24 100.0% Massachusetts 14 7 50.0% Michigan 83 20 24.1% Minnesota 87 23 26.4% Mississippi 82 24 29.3% Missouri 115 36 31.3% Montana 56 1 1.8% Nebraska 93 21 22.6% Nevada 17 5 29.4% New Hampshire 10 4 40.0% New Jersey 21 14 66.7% New Mexico 33 13 39.4% New York 62 38 61.3% North Carolina 100 47 47.0% North Dakota 53 1 1.9% Ohio 88 29 33.0% Oklahoma 77 2 2.6% Oregon 36 13 36.1% Pennsylvania 67 42 62.7% Rhode Island 5 3 60.0% South Carolina 46 25 54.3% South Dakota 66 14 21.2% Tennessee 95 36 37.9% Texas 254 38 15.0% Utah 29 12 41.4% Vermont 14 6 42.9% Virginia 134 117 87.3% Washington 39 16 41.0% West Virginia 55 15 27.3% Wisconsin 72 58 80.6% Wyoming 23 10 43.5% District of Columbia 1 1 100.0% ================================================================== UNITED STATES 3143 1056 33.6% Are there really 3143 counties in the United States? There were 3143 counties and county-equivalent administrative units listed by the United States Bureau of the Census as of 2010. In Alaska they are called boroughs and in Louisiana they are called parishes. Examples of county-equivalent administrative units are independent cities (mainly in Virginia, but also a few others), several named census areas that are part of the larger Unorganized Borough in Alaska, and the District of Columbia which is neither a county nor a state. However for purposes of the Census, these are all considered the equivalent of counties. This can get complicated so if this topic interests you, check out Wikipedia's County (United States) page for a technical discussion. Do Counties change? Counties and county-equivalents do change, although not nearly as frequently as when the United States was young and growing. Here are a few fairly recent examples: Two locations in Virginia gave up their independent city status and became part of their surrounding counties; South Boston in 1995, and Clifton Forge in 2001. Dade County, Florida was renamed Miami-Dade County in 1997. Portions of Yellowstone National Park located in Montana, formerly a county-equivalent, were incorporated into surrounding counties in 1999. Cibola County, New Mexico was formed in 1981 and Broomfield County, Colorado was formed in 2001. There have been a number of recent changes to Alaska's boroughs and unorganized boroughs, as recently as 2008. So even today the "number of counties" is a moving target.