Twelve Mile Circle – An Appreciation of Unusual Places

Twelve Mile Circle

  • Another Favorite Travel Tip

    On the second day of my business trip to Chicago, I thought I would share another one of my favorite travel trips (remember the first one?). This tip is for those of you who have young children. The Trap A long time ago I used to travel fairly frequently with a co-worker who had several…

  • They Reversed the Chicago River

    What’s a growing city to do when its water supply is jeopardized by its own filth? If it’s Chicago and it’s the late 19th Century, they reverse the flow of an entire river system. In the process they purposely punctured a Continental Divide. I’m in Chicago this week so I wanted to make sure I…

  • East Coast Sunsets over Water

    We all have visions of a romantic Hollywood movie with a classic California scene. Naturally it includes a vibrant sunset over calm Pacific waters. I recall a conversation I had a number of years ago with a west coast native. He raved about those sunsets with an air of superiority. Obviously people on the east…

  • Google Street View Comes to Washington, DC Area (finally!)

    I’m about a week late, but I did notice when I went into Google Maps recently that the Washington, DC area has finally been added to Street View. I’d been grousing about it for awhile and thought it might never happen. This was a long time coming. Witnesses spotted the photo car in the District…

  • Caribbean Ferries

    Regular readers have gotten used to my unnatural fascination with, and periodic musings about ferries. I’ve been slowly cataloging and mapping ferry systems from around the world using the Google Maps API. The operative word being slowly. I’m finally ready to release the latest compilation. Ferries of the Caribbean (and beyond). Check it out! This…

  • The Twelve Mile Circle, Part II

    An arc-shaped portion of the border between Delaware and Pennsylvania serves as the most visible manifestation of the so-called Twelve Mile Circle, as noted in the previous entry. However other impacts can also be discerned. The oddity also effects the Delaware – New Jersey boundary, albeit less visibly. Refer back to the map again and…

  • The Twelve Mile Circle, Part I

    Today marks the one-year Anniversary of this website, Twelve Mile Circle. However I’ve yet to explain the actual Twelve Mile Circle behind the name. I promised myself I would do so if I could keep this site active for a year, and I’ve now met that goal. So here goes. As many regular readers already…

  • A Colonial Capital

    I spent some of last week on business travel to Williamsburg, Virginia. Unfortunately I sat in a conference room for most of the time. However, I did manage to make it out to the historic sites for a few brief moments. Geography made Williamsburg the capital of the Virginia Colony and geography later took that…

  • Halloween Spots

    It’s Halloween here in the United States, so for a little fun today let’s feature some geography that fits within that spooky theme. One of the more obvious choices would be Salem, Massachusetts, site of the famous witch trials in 1692-1693. Over 150 people were imprisoned for witchcraft, with nineteen accused victims hanged and one…

  • Sticking it to the Man (border style)

    In recent posts I’ve listed examples of state and local governments leveraging the geography of their physical borders. They’ve generated tax revenue from outsiders who had no electoral standing to challenge it. For instance, I discussed situations found in the Southwick Jog of Massachusetts and the interstate highway traveling through northern Delaware. However, every once…

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  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…