How the States Got Their Shapes

"[A] wonderfully entertaining account of an often-overlooked oddity of America's history: how the jigsaw-puzzle layout of the United States emerged." -Vogue
The New York Times Bestseller

Why does Oklahoma have that panhandle? Did someone make a mistake?

We are so familiar with the map of the United States that our state borders seem as much a part of nature as mountains and rivers. Even the oddities-the entire state of Maryland(!)-have become so ingrained that our map might as well be a gia...