May 11 – Minnesota's Statehood Day

nPostednon May 11, 2016

nThenname Minnesota means “clear blue water” in the Dakotanlanguage.

nMinnesota’snnickname is “Land of 10,000 Lakes.”

nSo,nI bet you know what I am going to feature on the anniversary ofnMinnesota becoming the 32^nd state of the United States (onnthis date in 1858)….

Minnesota’s lakes!

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nSo…doesnMinnesota REALLY have 10,000 lakes? Or is that an exaggeration?

nActually, that’s an understatement! There are actually 11,842 lakes of more than ten acres in size!

nBecausenof the sheer number of lakes, there are many repeat names. Fornexample, there are 2 Alice Lakes, 2 Anderson Lakes, 2 Andrew Lakes, 2nAnna Lakes, 4 Ann Lakes, and a whopping 7 Augusta Lakes! (And that’snjust the repeats for the letter “A”!)

nHere’snwhere it gets bad: according to 50 States, Minnesota has 201 different MudnLakes, 154 Long Lakes, and 123 Rice Lakes!

nTonsee a list of Minnesota’s lakes, check out Wikipedia.

nHerenare some cool things about Minnesota’s waters:

nMinnesota’sn waters flow in various directions. Some rivers flow north to Hudsonn Bay, in Canada; some flow east to the Atlantic Ocean; and some flown south to the Gulf of Mexico.

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n(I hope it doesn’t surprise you to learn that all of Minnesota’s rivers flow DOWNwards.)

nVoyageursn National Park is the largest water-based park in the National Parkn System.

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nLaken Superior, which touches on Minnesota as well as other states andn Canada, is the largest of the Great Lakes and, as a matter of fact,n the largest freshwater lake in North America. It is the thirdn largest freshwater lake in the world (by surface area).

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Lake Superior is so large, it looks a lot like an ocean.

nThen total surface water area in Minnesota, including both deep water andn wetlands, is more than 13 million acres. That’s enough surface watern area to cover all of Connecticut and Rhode Island, together!

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nThis is one reason people like lakes: They love to fish!!
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