US/Canadian Border Trivia Question

Factual Questions
1

From a trivia quiz on a user-input trivia board, http://www.FunTrivia.com:

How many states share borders with Canada?
[Choices are:] 15 10 14 13

I answered 13: Alaska, Washington, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine. I took a close look at Wisconsin, which claims some of Lake Superior, but only 25 miles from its shore. Canada is another 70 miles away.

The author’s answer was 14. In the answers, there’s room for further info, in which he stated:

I wrote him to correct it, since every map I could find shows that Wisconsin’s claim is 70 miles from Canada. (I also corrected his MA for Maine instead of ME) He replied:

I disagreed, saying that means that the US and France border, because they are both next to the Atlantic Ocean. I also mentioned that the state border for Minnesota and Michigan runs from a point in Lake Superior 25 miles NE of Madeline Island to just east of Grand Portage, MN. Since those two states have a 70 mile border, Wisconsin and Ontario cannot, and therefore Wisconsin has no Canadian border.

He modified his further info:

ARGH!

So I ask you all: Do you consider Wisconsin and Ontario adjacent because they share a claim to Lake Superior, or not?

2

Every map, I’ve dug shows that Wisconsin’s claim to Lake Superior ends well short of Canada. The Wisconsin part of Lake Superior includes all of the Apostle Islands. Madeline Island isn’t even the northernmost one in the group.
Michigan’s and Minnesota’s portions of Lake Superior both border Ontario however.

3

Since Michigan and Minnesota share an underwater border in Lake Superior, that makes it physically impossible for Wisconsin and Ontario to do the same. Merely sharing a shore on the same body of water does NOT qualify two entities to share a border. If that were the case then ALL non-landlocked countries would technically border one another.

4

As every Wisconsinite knows, we do indeed share border with Canada. Well, um, that is, in the same way we share a border with Florida via the Mississippi and the Gulf of Mexico. :stuck_out_tongue:

5

Well, we would share a border if we can ever get organized and take back what is rightfully ours.

In other words “Take back the UP, hey!”

Oh shit ya der hey… it should be ours!

6

Easier said than done. You’d first have to get Ohio to give back the Toledo Strip, in order to make things fair. I’m sure Michigan would gladly trade back again.

7

If all you need is a direct water path, then it borders Canada, too. There’s nothing between Hawaii and B.C. but water.

Jim

8

Fair???

We blow one stinking bridge and take out some Hydro Ferries and the Trolls(No, not the trolls the Cecilian Mafia is after.) couldn’t even defend it. They are all Packer fans anyway.

Sorry about the hijack but this is the only way Wisconsin will ever border Canada.

9

Latest comment from the creator of the quiz:

sigh
Dunno what I’m going to say…

10

I do. Say, "I understand your point, but I am relentless in my fight against ignorance. As you doubtless know, it is an unfortunate truth that many people take the answers to ‘fun quiz’ questions as fact and they imbed them in their heads until they can’t remember where they heard the fact, and then they think something is true when it’s not. This is why so many people think the Great Wall of China is the only object visible from space; Trivial Pursuit got it wrong.

“So I appeal to your intelligence. Please either source your fact or drop the question. The cause of knowledge is counting on you.”

11

Apparently the creator of the above mentioned quiz feels no civic duty to provide correct information.

Ask him if 2 + 2 is 5 in his world.

Sounds like he is shaping the facts a bit with no true knowledge of what he is talking about anyway.

Do I need to show my passport when I am in the middle of Lake Superior then?

Besides he abbreviated Maine MA… you probably should have punted at that point.

12

Tell him that Isle Royale is NOT part of Wisconsin, it’s part of Michigan. plus it’s a NAtional park so it’s owned by the feds. and I don’t see how wisconsin is connected to Canada. You’d have to pull a NOAA nautical chart to really see though.

13

See, that’s why manhattan is a mod.

Patience and persistence.

I will pursue fighting the cause with more dogged determination in the future with no further mention of punting.

14

::Screeeeeeeeches to a halt…::

Waidaminnit…

Isn’t Lake Michigan entirely contained within the US?

15

Water or no water this is not a subjective matter. Water has nothing to do with this. Hawaii borders with international waters. The Great lakes are territorial waters and belong to whoever they belong. The fact that borders go over water as they do over land, changes nothing. Two territories (states, countries, etc) either they do have a common border or they don’t. There is no middle ground.

Right now there a rift going on between Maryland and Virginia over some work Va wants to do in the Potomac. The borde is on the VA shore so that all of the river is in MD and MD won’t let them do it.
So, whether the border is in the middle or on one side is immaterial, the fact is they have a border in common.

If there’s a line that when you cross it you go directly from one jurisdiction to the other, then you have a common border. If you have to go through a third jurisdiction, then you don’t. Water has nothing to do with it.