Talk:U.S. state/Archive 1

What sort of information should be in the article on each U.S. state? A lot of the articles presently contain information like the following, which was formerly on the Delaware page: "a state made famous by Wayne's World". Now those sort of items of trivia may be true, but do they really belong in an Encyclopedia article? There is an almost endless quantity of useless information you can say about anything; the trick is to find information which is relevant and interesting.

This is the kind of information which I think should be on each U.S. state's page:

• introduction: statement that it is a U.S. State, link to U.S. States.

• Geography

• • Physical geography (mountains, rivers, plains, elevation, that sort of thing)

• • National parks, etc.

• • adjacent U.S. states or oceans or Canadian provinces/Mexican states

• • Cities (including state capital)

• • List of counties (if someone wants to go to the trouble)

• Demography

• • state population

• • racial/ethnic makeup of state

• • religious makeup of state

• Economy

• • State income

• • Major industries/products

• • state taxes

• Law/Government of state [Note that all the U.S. states have similar legal and political systems, so maybe we only need to mention anything that makes the state distinct]

• • governor -- current, previous governors

• • legislature -- bicameral or unicameral? names of houses?

• • structure of state judicary

• • information on state constitution

• • does it have referenda?

• History

• • history prior to joining the United States

• • when first came under U.S. control (if it was a territory prior to being a state)

• • when it attained statehood

• • major historical events that occured in state

• Colleges/Universities in states, Sporting teams in state, similar lists.

Some of that info can probably be copied from U.S. government departments, or by asking the government of the state, (presuming that the info is public domain, which a lot of U.S. government info seems to be). But please no more states made famous by Wayne's World! -- Simon J Kissane