Affiliated States of Boreoamerica thread

[False Dmitri]

Hey, pempelune. Lousiana, the southern Indian states, and the Greater Antilles are on hold until I do more in-depth reading about the whole region. We know Cherokee's history: it was a protectorate first of England, then of Carolina. I have a sense that Choctaw had a similar relationship with Louisiana. Seminol and Muscogia were mortal threats to Spanish Florida in the early years, but they formed an alliance with the Spanish when it became clear that the English were a greater threat. I'm less sure about Chicasaw. I had half-written a story in which David Crockett, a soldier-statesman from Watauga, became a kind of alliance builder in the region and helped to draw the tribes together. I'd still like to write that.

Between the two Louisianas is Arques, a state that really is still in the Here Be Dragons part of the ASB. I know that during the Napoleonic era (ended 1833), Louisiana controlled the west bank of the river but had little presence in the hinterland. Louisiana declared independence upon the fall of the Empire. Upper and Lower were considered separate provinces at that point. Arques came about through a border agreement with Mexico. Probably this was a treaty that Louisiana signed rather than the ASB as a whole, so that would make Arques the third province. The three separated once the ASB was a permanent thing and splitting up was no longer dangerous. I know that Arques has a lot of Mormon settlements and a big Métis population. That's all so far.

While you were writing your post, I happened to be in the middle of doing a rebooted history of St. Pierre and Miquelon. I'll post that later this evening when I finish making edits. Hopefully it clears up some questions. The short answer is that I took the OTL history of the islands, the thing that makes them unique, and had it play out in the context of TTL.

And so far I had put no thought into the Lesser Antilles... I really like both of your ideas (an Antillean confederation and a strong Carib presence on Dominica). What do you think would be the limits of such a confederation? All the small islands?

 

[False Dmitri]

I've done a fair amount of rebooting and retconning over the years. I don't anticipate doing much more. But St Pierre had only a half-assed little blurb that obscured the uniquness of the islands, and that had to be fixed. What follows is more a geopolitical than a cultural history. I want to slend some time exploring the island's culture... but I'm planning a trip there in the nearish future. I know I'll write a lot more then. For now, we can think about what the islands' history reveals about the development of the ASB and its relationship to Europe.

I’d like to set some context first. As early as the 15th century the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon were an important base for fishermen from Normandy, Brittany, and the Basque Country. In the wars of the 18th century they passed back and forth between France and England. England repeatedly ordered the French settlers to be deported, but French fishing boats continued to frequent the islands. The conflicts over St. Pierre were part of the wider conflict over who controlled Newfoundland. In the treaty of 1808, England and the French Empire confirmed what was basically the status quo already: that Newfoundland would belong to England alone; that France would have exclusive fishing rights along part of the coast, but no territorial rights; and that France would possess the little islands so that it would have a toehold of land in the fishery.

Napoleonic France came to an end in 1832 after the death of Napoleon II. The young emperor was childless but not heirless and had taken pains to set up an orderly succession; nevertheless, republican forces saw their opportunity. The revolution was bloody but short. In North America, the four parts of the Kingdom of New France also took the opportunity to shake off French rule. Once news of the revolution arrived, independence was declared in Canada, Louisiana, Illinois, and Saint-Domingue. The only northern colonies that France managed to hold were Acadia, which was not part of the Kingdom of New France, and St. Pierre and Miquelon.

Years of dispute over the islands and the fisheries ensued between France and the new government of Canada. Canada considered itself the rightful successor to France and wanted to assume its role in the islands, the French Shore of Newfoundland, and Labrador. The dispute played out in the Congress of the Nations, which had emerged as the main deliberative body for all the Boreoamerican states. It remained unsolved in 1849 when Acadia, the last major French colony on the continent, declared its independence. The event sparked something of a crisis in Congress, since many delegates believed that some French presence was necessary to the continental balance of power. This faction was placated by a compromise that recognized St. Pierre and the French Shore rights as the property of the French Republic, not Canada. As compensation, Canada inherited France’s rights in Labrador.

St. Pierre’s status as the last French colony had economic and political consequences. The cod fishery was still valuable, and France was happy to keep its access to it even if it had lost its territorial colonies. And importantly for the ASB, the deal meant that a French delegation remained in Congress and would continue to have a voice in confederal affairs.

During this period, the population of the islands grew. Most of the newcomers came from the same regions that had supplied the earliest arrivals: Normandy, Brittany, and the French Basque Country. Smaller numbers of people arrived from nearby states; they included Newfoundlanders, Acadians, and Gaelic-speaking New Scots, resulting in a lively and unusual cultural mix. St. Pierre grew into a sizable town and received a proper government.

The evolving political structure of the ASB was giving more and more power to the elected Parliament. Congress, whose members were appointed by the state governments, including the French government of St. Pierre, faded into the background. The Parliament of 1868 is considered the first of the modern era, and in 1899 Congress was abolished as a legislative body. During these years the confederal government assumed control over member states’ military and foreign policy. France’s voice in the Congress became increasingly irrelevant.

In the late 19th century there were still some questions over how much right the former colonial powers had in their loyal Boreoamerican dominions. Newfoundland and southern New England were still in a sense part of the English Empire, while Christiana still had ties to Sweden and, through personal union, to the Russian Empire. France’s sovereignty over St. Pierre was seen in the same light. Therefore, the great European war that erupted in the early 20th century presented the very real danger that the ASB could become a theater of European conflict. The confederation had been founded precisely to prevent this sort of thing. Parliament, under the control of the centralizing branch of the Whig Party, passed strongly worded resolutions that banned European warships from ASB waters and built up the navy and coastal defenses to enforce the ban. The ASB ended up joining the war anyway, but the ban was upheld in subsequent treaties.

This meant that while St. Pierre remained part of the French Republic in name, in fact it was an integral part of the ASB. The islands had not had representation in Parliament before due to their very small population, never more than 10,000. Now they sought a status equal to the other states. They were recognized as a state in 1925. France had to begrudgingly accept its reduced role in the islands and enacted laws that loosened ties to St. Pierre and created an autonomous state government.

St. Pierre and Miquelon officially remained a French overseas territory, but France’s power was strictly circumscribed by a body of laws and treaties. French fishing fleets continued to come to the islands and to Newfoundland, but boats from the rest of the ASB were free to fish as well. French law applied somewhat, but acts of the ASB’s parliament took precedence, as St. Pierre was first and foremost an ASB state. The islanders today, though loyal citizens of the confederation, are still proud of the symbolic and economic links that they have with France. Their culture is more closely tied to Europe than the rest of Franco-America, and the state is a reminder of the legacy of the French overseas empire.

 

[False Dmitri]

Rebooted history calls for a rebooted flag. I know the flag of OTL St. Pierre is very recent, but I love it. That's enough for me, I think. I'm replacing some of the artwork with alternate versions that I prefer. The ship comes from New Brunswick's flag. And I'm replacing the one thing on the flag that looks out of place, the modern Basque flag, with the arms of the Kingdom of Navarre. This is meant to represent the historical Basque homeland rather than any modern entity. And I think a 1:2 ratio allows all the parts to fit together better.

 

[Pempelune]

And so far I had put no thought into the Lesser Antilles... I really like both of your ideas (an Antillean confederation and a strong Carib presence on Dominica). What do you think would be the limits of such a confederation? All the small islands?

I looked around and it seems that from 1958 to 1962 there was a West Indies Federation, including most of the British colonies of the Carribean. It collapsed due to infighting.
Here is how I imagined things:
- Dominica and St-Vincent became French protectorate, leaving a large part of the interior of the islands to the Caribs and the Black Caribs respectively;
- the colony of the Duchy of Courland in Tobago was much more successful (thanks to the strong Poland-Lithuania), and although the small duchy lost its colony to the English at some point, there is still a sizable Latvian population on the island, in addition to the French-speaking Free-Coloured slave owners that settled afterward (an OTL oddity due to the Spanish)
- the Danes could not sell their Danish Virgin Islands to the USA or Germany, but they still considered the Virgins a money sink. They were eventually sold to England.
- in the 1950s, the English colonies of the West Indies (Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, St-Lucia, Jamaica, St-Kitts and Nevis, Trinidad and Tobago, Grenada, Anguilla and Montserrat and the Virgin Islands) forms a West Indies Confederation, somewhat looser than OTL. Like OTL Jamaican discontent led to the island leaving the Confederation, but ITTL Tobago did not follow suit because the looser nature of a Confederation meant that it wasn't perceived as bad as IOTL, especially in regard to the funding.
- St-Vincent and Dominica took their independance roughly at the same period, while the other french possessions of the Lesser Antilles (St-Martin, St-Barth, Martinique, Guadeloupe) voted not to become a department but to gain more autonomy, and so did the Dutch islands.
- St-Vincent, Dominica, Guadeloupe and Martinique made several agreements (notably on trade, frontiers, etc) so as to integrate the four islands into a local alliance of states, so did in the north St-Barth, St-Martin, St-Marteen, Saba and St-Eustacius (the dutch islands).
- Finally the Confederation of the West Indies and these two local alliance entered into a EU-like relationship, to form the Union of Antillean States. It's for the moment very loose but is on the path toward greater central power.

So that would make a federation of all the Lesser Antilles minus the Dutch ABC islands (which are not really in the Antilles Arc to begin with). The rest of the Carribean would be either ASB or independant (Jamaica and Porto Rico).

Also, your Davie Crockett story sounds great

 

[Fluffr_Nuttr]

Hey guys! If you people like worldbuildng as much as I do, then check out the Collaborative Worldbuilding Project. We have some really cool stuff going on, like planet building, magic, and gods! So if you want to check it out, you can find it right on the Maps and Graphics forum.

 

[False Dmitri]

I'm back from a trip to Cuba! I'm currently dealing with the dilemma of how to incorporate its complex history and culture into the ASB. Upvoteanthology had already sketched out a history that involves very strong Cimmarron communities, and it needs to be fleshed out and connected to the rest of the work here.

- Dominica and St-Vincent became French protectorate, leaving a large part of the interior of the islands to the Caribs and the Black Caribs respectively;

This sets up the Lesser Antilles to be a very ASB-like region. I like it a lot, and it helps resolve some contradictions caused by the world's Russowank. I'll elaborate a little below.

- the colony of the Duchy of Courland in Tobago was much more successful (thanks to the strong Poland-Lithuania), and although the small duchy lost its colony to the English at some point, there is still a sizable Latvian population on the island, in addition to the French-speaking Free-Coloured slave owners that settled afterward (an OTL oddity due to the Spanish)

Per the Russowank material, I know that the Courland colony survived, but as the empire took shape it came to be governed directly from St. Petersburg. So today they would be part of the giant Imperial Commonwealth that includes Russia, Poland, Sweden, Mongolia, Korea... but all of the little colonies on the fringes seem to have ended up as members of regional confederations.

I've established that the colonial culture of Tobago was largely German, rather than Latvian - Courland's ruling class was Baltic German. Influence from around the region was felt as well, and English, French, and Dutch people all lived on the island from early days.

- the Danes could not sell their Danish Virgin Islands to the USA or Germany, but they still considered the Virgins a money sink. They were eventually sold to England.
- in the 1950s, the English colonies of the West Indies (Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, St-Lucia, Jamaica, St-Kitts and Nevis, Trinidad and Tobago, Grenada, Anguilla and Montserrat and the Virgin Islands) forms a West Indies Confederation, somewhat looser than OTL. Like OTL Jamaican discontent led to the island leaving the Confederation, but ITTL Tobago did not follow suit because the looser nature of a Confederation meant that it wasn't perceived as bad as IOTL, especially in regard to the funding.
- St-Vincent and Dominica took their independance roughly at the same period, while the other french possessions of the Lesser Antilles (St-Martin, St-Barth, Martinique, Guadeloupe) voted not to become a department but to gain more autonomy, and so did the Dutch islands.

I like pretty much all of this, it's good to see this part of the world getting fleshed out. I think that Tobago would not be part of an English-based confederation, per above.

- St-Vincent, Dominica, Guadeloupe and Martinique made several agreements (notably on trade, frontiers, etc) so as to integrate the four islands into a local alliance of states, so did in the north St-Barth, St-Martin, St-Marteen, Saba and St-Eustacius (the dutch islands).

Similar to Tobago above, I know that St-Barth remained property of Sweden in TTL. The population is French-speaking, as it was in place before Sweden purchased the island. It could still be a part of that local alliance, since it includes both French and independent islands.

- Finally the Confederation of the West Indies and these two local alliance entered into a EU-like relationship, to form the Union of Antillean States. It's for the moment very loose but is on the path toward greater central power.

So that would make a federation of all the Lesser Antilles minus the Dutch ABC islands (which are not really in the Antilles Arc to begin with). The rest of the Carribean would be either ASB or independant (Jamaica and Porto Rico).

OK! That's a blank spot on the map that's been filled in. I really like your idea. The one change might be that Tobago is part of the UAS but not any local alliance. Or could it be part of the same bloc as St. Barts and the French islands?

I have a question: The California Union was conceived as an attempt to replicate the ASB, but on the West Coast. It did not work as planned, and it's often described as an unsuccessful experiment. How does the UAS function? I would imagine it would be fairly successful and largely democratic. How much do you think the former colonizers meddle in their islands nowadays?

To keep track, let's look at the outlying members of the Imperial Commonwealth, former colonies of Russia or Poland or Sweden. I like the idea of all of them being part of regional blocs, as well as the Imperial Commonwealth itself.

• Christiana (New Sweden) is part of the ASB.
• Russian California is part of the California Union.
• Tobago (Curonian) and St. Barts (Swedish) are part of the Union of Antillean States.

Given all that, it's possible that the two tiny African colonies also joined regional confederacies of some kind. They are Gambia, a former colony of Courland, and Assab, a dry stretch of coastline in Eritrea that was colonized by Russia. These regional confederacies probably play an important part in the world balance of power, since they limit the power that colonizer nations have in their overseas possessions.

 

[False Dmitri]

One more piece for St. Pierre. As part of being a real state and all that, St. Pierre and Miquelon's main roads have number designations. The signs follow the standard French design, but are idiosyncratic. They were influenced by the tendency in other ASB states to use signs with distinctive symbols. Rather than starting with a standard letter, the main roads on St. Pierre are SP1, 2, 3, and 4, and the road that runs the length of Miquelon is labelled M1. SP1 is the principal road on the island. It runs mostly north-south, running along the town's waterfront and ending at the airport.

 

[Pempelune]

OK! That's a blank spot on the map that's been filled in. I really like your idea. The one change might be that Tobago is part of the UAS but not any local alliance. Or could it be part of the same bloc as St. Barts and the French islands?

It's probably only a member of the UAS. For one, because it makes the UAS more bizarre, and also because its presence could be one of the reasons that led to the UAS being more that a forum for smaller alliances.

I have a question: The California Union was conceived as an attempt to replicate the ASB, but on the West Coast. It did not work as planned, and it's often described as an unsuccessful experiment. How does the UAS function? I would imagine it would be fairly successful and largely democratic. How much do you think the former colonizers meddle in their islands nowadays?

The UAS began as a forum for the smaller alliances of the Carribean (which would be the Confederation of the West Indies and the two "French" associations of states, whose names might be: the Etats Associés des Caraïbes for the Saba/Eustacius/St-Martin/St-Marteen/St-Barth one and the Alliance de Roseau for the other).
These three are quite different though.
The EAC would probably be the most centralised of all: its constituents islands are tiny (Saba is only 2000 people IOTL, probalby a bit more IITL) so they decided early on to share a lot of their competencies. It would probably be on Swiss/Germany levels of central power. The ex-colonizers thus have rather low levels of influence on these islands.

The Alliance is much looser: Martinique and Guadeloupe still have strong ties to the métropole, the constituents islands are among the most heavily populated, and Dominica and St-Vincent would not accept to let Martinique and Guadeloupe have too much power over them. Roseau, capital of Dominica, was chosen as capital as a compromise between the two sub-groups and the role of the Alliance is more to allow the members to enjoy more influence on the global stage by talking as one than anything else. So, there is no common Parliament (contrary to the other two alliances). Its main role is economic (the islands are in a monetary union although the French islands also have the French Franc as a currency, bizarrely enough) and for foreign relations. The "president" of the Alliance, officially the "Représentant des Etats de l'Alliance", is chosen by the head of states of the four islands (unanimity is needed).

Finally, the Confederation would be intermediary: the islands are numerous and generally not very big, apart from Trinidad which is the most influential member. Contrary to the other alliances its islands are all independants and of the same culture (more or less). It used to be kept fairly powerless by Trinidad, which refused to allow more centralisation (and threatened to leave altogether) for fear of ending up paying for the other states' bill but since the creation of the UAS it is a less potent threat and the CWI is now fairly centralized and getting more so.

Thus, the UAS is a complicated deal. It began more as an mean for the three local alliances to discuss common problems than anything else, but it became progressively more: Tobago pushed for it because it wanted to be part of an alliance that would offer similar advantages to the one offered by the CWI and the EAC (none of these being willing to accept Tobago, the CWI mainly for cultural reasons (it wanted to stay an all-British alliance) and the EAC because Tobago is too big and too far away), while the EAC itself wanted to have closer ties to its neighbors and share some responsabilities (notably healthcare: Saba is a bit removed from the other islands but is too small for an hospital).
In the end, the UAS is a bit of a mess. The northern islands of the Confederations of the West Indies began making agreements with the EAC and the southern with Tobago, even though technically those agreements were the responsability of the Confederation as a whole: the representation of the CWI in the UAS exploded into various alliances in disagreement with each others.

As the benefits of these deals were too big to be ignored, the CWI had to deal with it: the CWI accepted to allow each island to send its own delegation, at the condition that the other alliances would do so too.
To this day, the UAS it thus mainly a Parliament, to which every island send its delegation (how the representatives are chosen is left to the discretion of the island). The representatives then make propositions, which are binding only to the signatories (except they touch to the UAS as a whole).
It also has a President which, like for the Alliance, is mainly there for foreign relations (and notably representations at alt-UN).


So, in the end, the Union of Antillean States is democratic, because the member states themselves are democratic, but it's not direct democracy. Its functionment tends to undermine the power of the most centralising local alliances and generally generates a lot of weird things which unnerves the CWI to no end but so far it works fairly well. Attempts at reforming the institution are made regularly but the unability to make everyone agrees on anything tends to block the process. As the number of agreements between only some of the islands continue to grow and that the proposed reforms are unable to make all these fit into a common constitution, the UAS is unlikely to change anytime soon.

 

[Turquoise Blue]

@False Dmitri: Hi. I haven't contributed much recently, but I'm still up for more.

Love the flag, it's great.

 

[False Dmitri]

@False Dmitri: Hi. I haven't contributed much recently, but I'm still up for more.

Love the flag, it's great.

Wonderful! We should revisit Cuba. You wrote so much as a draft, but it never got finished or shared publicly.

 

[Turquoise Blue]

Wonderful! We should revisit Cuba. You wrote so much as a draft, but it never got finished or shared publicly.

What I'm thinking for Cuba is that it's not an island that goes much for Hispanic nationalists at a state level. It's very much dominated by the Socialist and Democratic affiliates there, with rather weak liberals and strong greens compared to the norm.

At a federal level, I can certainly see it as a sort of analogue to 2000s Quebec. Hispanic nationalists strong, but Socialists and Democrats strong as well. Or something like that. I can see the old Quebecois saying: "Heaven is blue, hell is red" being used, since the Democrats in Cuba are probably strongly Christian-democratic.

 

[False Dmitri]

What I'm thinking for Cuba is that it's not an island that goes much for Hispanic nationalists at a state level. It's very much dominated by the Socialist and Democratic affiliates there, with rather weak liberals and strong greens compared to the norm.

At a federal level, I can certainly see it as a sort of analogue to 2000s Quebec. Hispanic nationalists strong, but Socialists and Democrats strong as well. Or something like that. I can see the old Quebecois saying: "Heaven is blue, hell is red" being used, since the Democrats in Cuba are probably strongly Christian-democratic.

*smack* I'm getting my friends mixed up. Upvote wrote all the draft Cuba content, not you. Blame my advanced age.

Yes, I had been thinking that nationalism and separatism were not going to be particularly strong on Cuba. In the Dominicas, yes, but Cuba itself has always been integral to the ASB, its voice has generally been an influential one, and its people have close economic, cultural and emotional ties to the mainland. Culturally, Cuba is very assertive and there's a strong sense of its separate nationhood - but that's true of most of the states.

 

[Upvoteanthology]

*smack* I'm getting my friends mixed up. Upvote wrote all the draft Cuba content, not you. Blame my advanced age.

Yes, I had been thinking that nationalism and separatism were not going to be particularly strong on Cuba. In the Dominicas, yes, but Cuba itself has always been integral to the ASB, its voice has generally been an influential one, and its people have close economic, cultural and emotional ties to the mainland. Culturally, Cuba is very assertive and there's a strong sense of its separate nationhood - but that's true of most of the states.

Haha, I should write more for this project though. The Cuba stuff was maybe, like, two years ago at this point? I'd be happy to help out with it again with your input.

 

[Tyche]

Saw this out in the MapPorn subreddit, uses AncestryDNA samples. I thought it could be useful in mapping English stocks, as iirc @False Dmitri was still unsatisfied with the existent maps of the distribution of English stocks. Of course there's demographic changes that impacted the ABS and not the USA, but I think the general trends would be the same.

(https://www.wired.com/2017/02/770000-tubes-spit-help-map-americas-great-migrations/)

 

[False Dmitri]

Saw this out in the MapPorn subreddit, uses AncestryDNA samples. I thought it could be useful in mapping English stocks, as iirc @False Dmitri was still unsatisfied with the existent maps of the distribution of English stocks. Of course there's demographic changes that impacted the ABS and not the USA, but I think the general trends would be the same.

This is pretty amazing, I can't believe I missed it before. This is something I'll really have to digest. I like the format of the map - you can see the distribution of the OTL equivalents of the Stocks, and the diminishing size of the circles helps show information that I had trouble expressing using normal map colors.

... Unrelated, this map is clearly just playing around: New Amsterdam as it might have looked with a system of grachten toward the end of the 18th century. I have never made a city map before, but I would like to try a proper one, at least for Lower Manhattan. I expect that most modern commercial development has been north of the Wall; to the south, you have the colonial city, nowadays mostly a center of tourism.

 

[Hominid]

Saw this out in the MapPorn subreddit, uses AncestryDNA samples. I thought it could be useful in mapping English stocks, as iirc @False Dmitri was still unsatisfied with the existent maps of the distribution of English stocks. Of course there's demographic changes that impacted the ABS and not the USA, but I think the general trends would be the same.

(https://www.wired.com/2017/02/770000-tubes-spit-help-map-americas-great-migrations/)

I still don't get what this map is showing. Why are Portuguese only in Jamaica and California?

 

[False Dmitri]

I've been tinkering with this map for a couple of weeks. I wanted to work out the internal geography of some of the mid-Atlantic states and see how the whole region fits together. As such, this is a sketchbook type map for figuring stuff out rather than something nice to show off to the guests. Many of the borders were copy-pasted from other maps, which is why they have different sizes and styles. But it taught me a lot about some of the less explored regions of the ASB, and with any luck it will lead to some nicer-looking maps in the future. I liked making it, in particular Iroquoia. Soon I'll be ready to post a written description of how it evolved into the modern state of today.

There are some parts that are not finished at all. Huronia and Allegheny ought not be so empty. There are a couple of towns that don't have names yet. But realistically I am not going to get to those things for a long time, so I may as well share this now.

 

[Sternberg]

I need to get back into drawing. May I be able to utilize my somewhat-rusty artistic talents to draw some POIs and landmarks in each state? I want to hone and practice my ability to draw scenery.

Don't pin me to it, I most likely will procrastinate. Prodding me to draw will be appreciated, and I want to contribute to this somehow, make myself contribute something to get back into the spin of worldbuilding.

 

[False Dmitri]

I need to get back into drawing. May I be able to utilize my somewhat-rusty artistic talents to draw some POIs and landmarks in each state? I want to hone and practice my ability to draw scenery.

Don't pin me to it, I most likely will procrastinate. Prodding me to draw will be appreciated, and I want to contribute to this somehow, make myself contribute something to get back into the spin of worldbuilding.

Sure - this isn't quite a team project, at least not yet, but different people have certainly contributed to it. A few people have done substantial writing and drawing, and some others have donated individual drawings and ideas. What areas are you looking to map? Almost any area could use a map with more detail, but the south and the west of the ASB are particularly unexplored - to say nothing of the countries beyond it, which have not been mapped in any detail except for a couple of spots in California. (I did a map of the Bay Area, and Doctor President did a glorious one of the San Diego region.)

 

[Sternberg]

Just for shits and giggles, the ASB organized into 13 commonwealths like in Fallout.

If fun not allowed, perhaps we can delve into architectural drawing a la Skyscraperpage? Tallest/most prominent man-made structure in each state.