From The Baptist Record, 1987.

From the Duluth Evening Herald, 1906.

"UFOs & monsters plague the 'Michigan Rectangle.'"  From Weekly World News, 1981.

From Saint Francis College's 1952 yearbook.

Uncle Sam's profile is the United States turned on its side.  From St. Nicholas, 1893.

A rough route to oblivion, charting the course taken by the victims.  From Barnard's 1908 yearbook.

From Nebelspalter, 1886.

In our photo of chronologician Michael, he is not actually looking at his invisible watch but rather consulting the living map that he's wearing.  (A living map never gets outdated but rather, remaining mysterious to its core, is a provocation to experience, casting as it does the luminosity of presence.  A living map is full of latencies, providing criteria by which a competent discoverer may test his projected conjectures.)

The eagle of the Americas as seen by Arthur McGray.  From National Magazine, 1903.

You've heard of the way to count seconds with "One Mississippi, two Mississippis," and so forth.  There actually are two Mississippis, with light and dark halves.  This map is from Mississippi Delta Junior College's 1964 yearbook.  Apparently, "two Mississippis ... emerged in the late twentieth century" (Bradley Bond, Mississippi).  And "the two Mississippis, one black and one white, converged momentarily" (Alan Draper, Conflict of Interests).  You may previously have heard of the "two Mississippis of William Faulkner and Eudora Welty."  It's even been said that Faulker himself had two Mississippis, his mythical one and his geographical one.

"Somehow I have to face up to these two Mississippis: the one I love and the one I hate" —W. Ralph Eubanks, Ever Is a Long Time

We like the four winds in these endpapers from Swarthmore's 1940 yearbook.

You've heard that Michigan is the "Mitten State," and here is revealed the giant hand inside that mitten.  From 1950.