Four Corners monument


The Four Corners is a region of the United States consisting of southwest Colorado, northwest New Mexico, northeast Arizona and southeast Utah.The name comes from the Four Corners Monument, located where the four states touch—the only location in the United States that is on the boundaries of four states. The majority of the Four Corners region is part of semi-autonomous indigenous nations. Two of these are the Navajo Nation and the Ute Mountain Ute Indian Reservation which have a boundary at the Four Corners Monument in addition to the four states. The Navajo Nation includes three of the four state corners; the Ute Mountain Reservation only has the Colorado corner.

The United States first acquired the area now called Four Corners from Mexico after the Mexican American War in 1848. The area was first surveyed by the U.S. Government in 1868 as part of an effort to form the state of Colorado, the first of the Four Corners states formed. The Four Corners was established as the jurisdictional boundary in 1901 when the boundaries of the Arizona Territory were established. The first marker was placed at the spot in 1912.

The Four Corners Area is generally defined as a circle around the Four Corners Monument located at 36°59'56.31532?N 109°02'42.62019?W A series of news stories from April of 2009 indicated that more recent surveys had determined that the intersection of the corners was not where it was intended to be. However, the news stories used whole degree co-ordinates, not accounting for the fractional degree offset between the Washington Meridian, standard used at the time, and the current standard, the Prime Meridian. In addition, general U.S. land principles, law,and the Supreme Court have determined that the location of the monument is the legal corner of the four States - doesn't matter what the coordinates be...

Source and Credits: Wikipedia
Source and credit for Image: Google Earth