Like, can you name just a few large cities in certain regions, none at all, wtf is the USA, etc.
The USA is geopolitically isolated in a rather unique way on the global stage where this is an interesting perspective.
The first I thought of was Dead Horse, Alaska. Permanent population 25 - 50, I understand.
I really can’t recall where I first heard of it though.
I have probably heard of a few other odd ones like this.
That’s where the “definitely just a balloon, don’t pay any attention” landed after the Chinese spy balloon was shot down about a year ago.
At least that’s the first time I heard of Dead Horse.
Smallest I know of is Lyle, Minnesota (population of 573). The only reason I know that is because I added all of the buildings there to OpenStreetMap - before and after photo on Mastodon.
I am from the USA but I want to say that for any foreigner who’s seen the movie Groundhog Day (or news about the occasion), the answer is Punxutawney.
Filmed in Woodstock, IL.
My childhood is a lie!
Smallest settlement I know would be Intercourse, Pennsylvania. Not a city by any stretch.
The next one that comes to mind is Jackson, Jackson Hole, Wyoming where we had an exchange student from 20+ years ago.
Gary Indiana?
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Tbh I don’t even remember why I know the name.
A few smaller ones that pop into my head are Boulder, Amarillo, Centralia (does that still count?), Slab city (not sure that counts either), Salem and Providence. Looking it up, the smallest proper city of these is Salem with 44k.
I could also probably name a ton of European city names and there will be small towns in the USA with that name, but that would kind of be cheating.
Which Centralia? The one that inspired Silent Hill? Or the site of the anti-labor massacre?
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Yup. We had those on the West Coast too.
I was thinking of the one with the cracked roads and the fire burning below. So that’s probably the former? Haven’t actually heard of the massacre I think.
That is indeed. The massacre happened in Centralia, WA on the other side of the continent.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia_massacre_(Washington)
And which salem… lol. (I know which you mean, but there are others too. Very few names in the US aren’t used many times.)
The witchy one! Funnily enough, when I googled it for the population number, I found that there’s also a Salem in my home state of Baden-Württemberg in Germany. I had never heard of that one, despite having been within like 15km of it.
I believe I heard about the german one by name but not sure.
Probably Boring, Oregon. It is twinned with a town near me called Dull
My general geography of the States is alright due to a bunch of American friends and a girlfriend, but definitely not great
Drove through there (Boring) an hour ago. It’s a cute place
I have passed through Dull only once, and it was unintentional. It’s in a beautiful area, though! While there’s not really anything to see in Dull itself - it’s basically just a collection of about thirty houses - it definitely has the views
I think if I’m ever in Oregon I’ll have to take a little pilgrimage to Boring. Oregon seems cool. Same goes for Bland in Australia, since it joined the little club. They call it the Trinity of Tedium.
Nevada city, California. Population 3k+. Thanks to my wife’s addiction to christmas movies.
Hey, I’ve been there! Related to Christmas, every year Nevada City has a Victorian Christmas celebration where they all dress fancy and neighboring Grass Valley has Cornish Christmas, that seems to celebrate the working class. Total speculation on my part, I’m guessing in the 1800s all the mine owners lived in Nevada City and all the miners lived in Grass Valley.
Wayland, Texas. According to wikipedia it had a population of 100 people in the year 2000. AFAIK it’s a ghost town now.
I know that town because I once read a “fun fact” about the Wayland Protocol that said its name was chosen for being the name of an actual town, which (supposedly) cannot be copyrighted.
I stopped for gas in London, Texas recently. My wife looked it up, and it had a population of 188 about 20 years ago, and nobody has counted since.
The lady behind the counter at the gas station was ancient. She had a handwritten “no loitering” sign on the door that seemed ironic.
Naw that sign was there to chase off Steve. Sumbitch always hanging around harassing the womenfolk what come in to buy their sundries, never buying anything.
I have zero idea how big any city in the US is beyond “big”. I couldn’t begin to rank them by size
Hell, Michigan. Uniquely memorable, for some reason.
I’ll be honest with ya, no fucking clue which of them is smaller or not.
Paris, Texas. Yeah, from the movie.
Huh. Didn’t know that was in a movie.
That is a small town though. If you like corn, oil and wild hogs you would be a good fit down there.
Pflugerville. My mother has lived there for a while. She moved back to Europe when she got pregnant.
Pflugerville is pretty big now, there’s. Lot of industry moving north of Austin.
Truth or Consequences, NM
Heard it on a true crime podcast once and obviously I had to look up how it got its name and now it’s just stuck.
EDIT: Missed the never travelled to qualifier. I’ve been to California twice and NYC once. Only heard of Truth or Consequences after my travels.
I’m from the US and I only know about Truth or Consequences from Doctor Who.
