Questions? Get live answers at PBwiki's weekly office hours (1 PM Eastern, Weds September 3)

Places: Geography, Countries, Travel

Maps, Distance
Countries
United States

Maps, Distance

Distance Calculator: How Far Is It? http://www.infoplease.com/atlas/calculate-distance.html

Similar to indo.com calculator, but offers worldwide data.

Geographic Names Information System http://mapping.usgs.gov/

Search for places in the United States by feature, state or county name; feature type; population or elevation range. Returns detailed geographical data for each region found.

Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names (TGN) http://www.getty.edu/research/conducting_research/vocabularies/tgn/

This thesaurus contains nearly 1 million place names representing approximately 900,000 places. Users can browse the world hierarchically, or use the search function.

How Far Is It? http://www.indo.com/distance/

Calculates the distance (as the crow flies) between two places. Very few places outside the United States are included. Also useful as a quick way to look-up county names for cities (for finding county libraries)

Map Machine http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/mapmachine/

The National Geographic Society's map and geographical information site contains maps, profiles, and facts about the countries of the world and the U. S. states.

MapQuest http://www.mapquest.com/

What's the best route from Los Angeles to Albuquerque? This free, interactive street atlas of the continental United States provides detailed route information. You may also obtain information on the city you are going to visit; the weather, where to eat, where to stay and what to do.

Return to top

Countries

CIA World Factbook https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/index.html

Published annually, by the Central Intelligence Agency, this is a handy reference work for basic statistical data on the countries of the world.

Constitution Finder http://confinder.richmond.edu/country.php

This site provides links to constitutions, charters, amendments and other related documents of national government for nations of the world. There is an alphabetical listing of countries for you to browse. Information for some countries comes in a variety of languages.

Consulates and Embassies http://dir.yahoo.com/Government/U_S__Government/Embassies_and_Consulates/

Yahoo's directory listing of consulates and embassies with Web pages. A good place to look for visa information.

Country Studies http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/

Each study is written by a multidisciplinary team of social scientists. Most books in the series deal with a particular foreign country, describing and analyzing its political, economic, social, and national security systems and institutions. From the Library of Congress.

Nations of the World: Anthems, Flags, Maps, Weather (E-Conflic World Encyclopedia) http://www.emulateme.com/

Each entry includes a map, flag, and midi sound file of its national anthem. Also information about the country's economy, defense, geography, government, and people is given. Links to the National Weather Service current weather conditions for cities within each country, as well as news and local information are also provided. Much of the info is from the World Factbook.

U.S. Department of State Background Notes http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/

Background notes is an official United States Government publication which profiles countries and organizations of the world. Each entry generally includes the following on each country: Profile, People, Government, Economy, History, Political Conditions, Economy, Foreign relations, Principal U.S. Officials. Updated periodically.

World Flag Database http://www.flags.net/fullindex.htm

This is an alphabetical list of countries, territories and sub-national regions.

BBC NEWS | Country Profiles

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/country_profiles/default.stm

Return to top

United States

The 50 States http://www.infoplease.com/states.html

Clicking on a state on the U.S. map leads to information concerning that particular state. That includes names of government officials, a state map and flag, state trivia, population and geography data, and economic and social comparisons.

The 50 States of the United States: Capital Cities and Information Links http://www.50states.com/

This site lists the fifty states and information on their locations (latitude and longitude), birds, colleges and universities, constitutions, flowers, genealogical resources, geological formations, geographical features, mottos, national forests and parks, newspapers, nicknames, non profit organizations, populations, state and federal representatives, songs, and the dates of entry into the union. All facts are linked to over 1529 governmental or authoritative web pages.

QuestionPoint