{"id":14685,"date":"2014-02-20T19:33:08","date_gmt":"2014-02-21T00:33:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/?p=14685"},"modified":"2021-12-27T08:17:45","modified_gmt":"2021-12-27T13:17:45","slug":"united-states-colors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/united-states-colors\/","title":{"rendered":"United States of Colors"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I began to think about counties with colors in their names as I investigated the etymology<\/a> and history<\/a> of Blue Earth County, Minnesota in further detail. My mind began to wander down this completely unrelated tangent. Soon enough I found myself hunting through a list of US counties for examples and plotting them on a map.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"US<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Feel free to open this image within another tab or window if you’d like to take a closer look. I’ve shrunk the map down to match size limitations of the blog template even though the underlying graphics file is considerably larger. I’ve also provided a public spreadsheet<\/a> of my selections if you’re wondering what I discovered or if you’d like to check what I might have overlooked and offer any suggestions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Populating the Map<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I made arbitrary decisions in some instances. Obviously something like Frederick County didn’t quality as red even if the letters r-e-d appeared sequentially within its name. How about Greenwood and Greenlee qualifying as Green? I decided to count Greenwood because green wood exists, while Greenlee, well some sources said it may have meant green field or green meadow once long ago. Nonetheless it didn’t resonate with me so I dropped it. I know! Completely unjustified. The arbitrator is a capricious jerk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I bent protocols in the other direction, too. How about Cherry? That’s red. Vermilion? Also red. At that point I enjoyed my reacquaintance with the two counties bordering each other<\/a> in adjacent states, one in Illinois (Vermilion with one “l”) and one in Indiana (Vermillion with double “ll”).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, a big tip of the keyboard had to go to American patriot Nathanael Greene<\/a>. He began the American Revolutionary War as a private and worked his way up to Major General, responsible for all Continental Army troops in the southern campaign. Historians credited him with wearing down British general Cornwallis in the Carolinas, thereby driving the fight into Virginia where Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What does that have to do with anything? A grateful new nation named an astounding number of places for the famous patriot. Every one of the 14 Greene Counties in the United States honored Nathanael Greene, as did the Green Counties (inexplicably dropping the final “e”) established in Kentucky and Wisconsin. The collective Green\/e counties greened the map rather nicely, don’t you think?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enjoy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Colorful Sequence<\/h2>\n\n\n\n