Correcting common geographic misconceptions

 In anticipation of the 13th Geography Awareness Week (Nov 12-18), here's a simple quiz to test your geographic knowledge.

Name the most southern, northern, eastern and western states in the United States.

Even though the answers can be found in any atlas, it's surprising how few Americans can name the country's four extremities.

The most common answers: Florida in the south, Maine in the east, California in the west and Washington in the north.

All are wrong, because they overlook states 49 and 50.

Ka Lae Point, on the very tip of the Big Island of Hawaii, is the piece of the United States that lies closest to the equator. And the country's northern-, eastern- and westernmost points are all located in Alaska.

The tip of Point Barrow is more than a thousand miles north of any place in the lower 48 states. And since the 180th meridian crosses the necklace of the Aleutian chain, two small islands on each side technically qualify as the eastern and western edges of the United States.

Even if the answer is confined to the lower 48 states, few people can be very specific about the four extremes.

Key West, Fla., is commonly credited with the distinction of being the southernmost point in the continental United States, even though it's connected to the mainland by a bridge. The Dry Tortugas, an uninhabited clutch of tiny islands that lie even farther southwest of Key West, might also be considered.

The point farthest east is West Quoddy Head, Maine. On the other coast, Cape Alava, a nodule on Washington State's Olympic Peninsula, is as far west in the nation as you can go without getting your feet wet. To find the northernmost point in the lower 48, it's necessary to visit the Red Lake Indian Reservation. It lies in Northwest Angle, Minnesota, the only notch on the otherwise arrow-straight U.S./Canada border that runs along the great arc of the 49th parallel.

And while we are clearing up that geophysical misconception, there's another glaring one that demands to be addressed.

What's the highest place on earth?

Most people instantly answer, Mount Everest. Peaking at a hair over 29,035-feet above sea level, Mount Everest certainly stands taller than any other point on the planet, at least as far as a Sherpa can climb.

You may be surprised to learn, however, that several other points on the rotating planet actually poke much farther into space than Mount Everest. And we're not talking about undersea mountains.

In fact, as the world turns, the point that comes closest to the moon is the top of Mount Chimborazo, an extinct, snow-capped volcano in the Andes Mountains of central Ecuador.

Here's why.

Since the time of Columbus, people have understood that the earth is round. However, it's not a perfect circle, but an oblate spheroid, a ball that is slightly flattened at its poles.

Several billion years of centrifugal force caused by the planet's unceasing rotation have given Mother Earth a pronounced midriff bulge. In fact, the diameter across the equator is 26 miles longer than the diameter between the poles.

Mount Chimborazo is situated about one degree south of the equator, while Everest is at about 28 degrees north latitude. Thus, though it is more than 9,000 feet lower in sea level stature than Everest, Chimborazo actually sticks about a mile and a half farther into space, because sea level for it is farther from the center of the earth than sea level for Everest.

Though nearby Mount Cotopaxi, an active volcano even closer to the equator, is a thousand feet shorter than Mount Chimborazo, it is still growing. Someday, it will rank as the tallest place on the planet.

Earth's equatorial bulge gives rise to a host of other geographic oddities. For example, New Orleans, which is located at about 29 degrees north latitude, happens to be nearly three miles farther from the earth's center than Lake Itasca, Minn., headwaters of the Mississippi River, which is situated a shade under 47 degrees north latitude.

Thus, Old Man River is forced to flow uphill on its 2,340-mile journey to the Gulf of Mexico.

Lots of geographic facts become oddities if you think about them.

For example, some Pittsburghers might puzzle over the fact that our fair city happens to lie farther west than the westernmost point in South America. Or that the highest point in Pennsylvania happens to be lower than the lowest point in Colorado.

And what about our celebrated three rivers? What makes this particular confluence of waterways special? Other places where two rivers come together, the smaller of the two generally loses its name and the larger flows on. Here, even though the Allegheny River is bigger than the Monongahela River, they come together and form a third river! What's that about? In fact, since the Ohio River is actually larger by volume than the Mississippi when they meet, the waterway that ends in the Gulf of Mexico southeast of New Orleans should, by all rights, be named the Allegheny.

Who says geography can't be fun?

At any rate, every year since Congress authorized the first Geography Awareness Week in 1987, the National Geographic Society has developed a curriculum of activities designed to spur the interest of students from kindergarten to grade 12 in geography. Each curriculum is organized around a theme. This year, it's "Conservation: Here Today, Here Tomorrow," with activities centered around Biodiversity, Fresh Water, Population and the Oceans. This is also the first year that classroom program materials are available for free online.

The Geography Awareness Week materials can be downloaded from www.nationalgeographic.com Teachers can call 202-775-6577 for a free Geography Awareness Week poster.