Twelve Mile Circle – An Appreciation of Unusual Places

Twelve Mile Circle

  • Vanishing South Georgia

    Recently I found myself pondering maps of the Savannah River south of Augusta. I wandered virtually among the oxbow lakes perched amid the Georgia – South Carolina border. Don’t bother asking why. By now you surely know that’s this is what passes for “fun” here on Twelve Mile Circle. Then a strange object arose as…

  • Wyndham Winter Warmer

    It’s been chilly lately at Twelve Mile Circle as winter approaches. Perhaps some warm thoughts will help me get through these cold evenings. I need to take my mind to the hottest spot on the planet. I might consider the place with the highest absolute recorded temperature. That would be Al ‘Aziziyah, Libya on September…

  • Lucky 7 & the Ghost Kid

    It all started with an innocent set of queries captured by my web stats. They seemed to follow a common theme somewhat like “strange boundary five points ma. conn.”[1] The only border anomaly between Massachusetts and Connecticut that I knew anything about was the Southwick Jog, which I featured back in October. Seven is More…

  • Smallest Largest Provincial Island in Canada

    You read that right. Perhaps I can rephrase it better: Each Canadian Province or Territory has a largest island. When considering that list, which one is the smallest? Today’s totally trivial topic comes courtesy of the confluence of many competing thoughts that pinged around my mind lately: I’m “-est” fixated (you know, things ending in…

  • Sandoval Exclave

    A small wedge of Sandoval County, New Mexico hovers off its eastern edge. It is a fully disembodied and totally separated from the remainder of the county. Thus, it’s a great example of an orphaned exclave. Google Earth captures this exclave rather nicely. Roughly it’s triangular, with a right angle on the northeast corner. Santa…

  • 75 Years of Drinking

    Today is the 75th Anniversary(1) of the repeal of Prohibition in the United States. In addition to my odd fascination with weird geography, I’m a horrible beer snob(2) and sometimes I even find ways to tie my fascination with beer and geography together. So I think of this as a big day for Twelve Mile…

  • Naval Ensigns of U.S. States

    Many of the colonies that became the original 13 United States had their own navies during the Revolutionary War. Indeed, only New Jersey and Delaware did not. Individual colonies hastily cobbled together fleets as the conflict unfolded. With these, they hoped to defend American shores from a superior British fleet. States formally commissioner some of…

  • Ghost Towns

    This is Matildaville. Little remains of this early 19th Century settlement built to serve the “Patowmack Canal” in what is now Great Falls Park. It sits the Virginia side of the Potomac River. I wrote a whole lot more about Great Falls and its history previously. But that’s besides the point. I got on a…

  • Aurora: A County Seat in Two States. Simultaneously!

    Nobody lives in Aurora today although upwards of five thousand people called it home immediately after its founding in 1860. No less a luminary than Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) called Aurora his home for several months during his mining days. It was a vibrant, successful town along the Nevada / California border. Both states claimed…

  • West Coast Sunrises over Water

    We’ve had fun watching the comments posted on my recent entry, East Coast Sunsets over Water. Matthew kicked things off when he wondered whether the opposite condition might exist. Does a West Coast sunrise ever happen over water? Scott Schrantz who has followed the Twelve Mile Circle for awhile, later solved the mystery by providing…

Latest Comments

  2. what is the total population that lives now in the land given back to Virginia should it be part of…

  5. Park ranger at Chalmette (New Orleans) Battlefield let me pull up the Union Jack 20 years ago. My dad would…