Academic Kids:WikiProject U.S. counties
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Wikiproject Guidelines
First, an important note for everyone to remember:A few Wikipedians have gotten together to make some suggestions about how we might organize data in articles about states, counties, cities and towns. These are only suggestions, things to give you focus and to get you going, and you shouldn't feel obligated in the least to follow them. But if you don't know what to write or where to begin, following the below guidelines may be helpful. Mainly, we just want you to write articles!
Definition
This WikiProject aims primarily to provide information on all of the U.S. states' counties, boroughs, (Alaska), census areas (Alaska), and parishes (Louisiana). It also provides information on the analogous administration districts (if any) in the current U.S. Federal Territories (District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, etc.).
Related projects
See also: WikiProject U.S. States, WikiProject Cities, Geographic references, WikiProject U.S. Special Districts.
Participants
- Ram-Man
- Wapcaplet
- James F.
- The Anome
- Redjar
- Bkonrad | Talk
- LouI
- Daniel C. Boyer
- Patricknoddy | talk
- User:Beland
Background
There is an article called County (United States), which discusses U.S. Counties in general, as opposed to any particular county, and provides a list of U.S. counties. It also lists the analogous administration districts of the current U.S. Federal Territories, and explains the differences between the various types of "counties". Pages on the administrative districts of U.S. Federal Territories are to have the same format as U.S. counties, subject to appropriate variances.
How to use the template
A template article can be found at the bottom of this page. This section explains aspects of writing good county articles that the template doesn't address.
Naming the article
Each U.S. county is called by the common name of the state, e.g. Jackson County, Michigan. Where needed, a link to the county is placed on a more general entry page, e.g. Jackson contains links to Jackson County, Michigan, Jackson, Mississippi, Jackson, Michigan, and many more.
How the text should flow
The article should consist of a few short paragraphs that give an outline of the history, politics, etc.. of the county. If any section becomes too long, It should be split off into a separate article with more detail, leaving a brief summary behind. The beginning of the section should look like this example:
== Geography == ''Main article: [[Geography of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania]]''
Content suggestions
- Introduction
- History
- Origin of the county's name
- Circumstances of the county's establishment
- Major historical events that occurred in county
- Law/Government
- County Executive-- current, previous executives
- representative body?
- Geography
- County seat -- see complete list of county seats at http://www.campbellslist.com/county_seats/select_county_seat.html
- Physical geography (area, unique features)
- List of Townships or other subdivisions
- List of Municipalities
- List of contiguous counties
- Major Parks and Cultural Institutions
- Notable Festivals and Parades, with dates
- Economy
- Major industries/products
- Taxes
- Demographics
- County population
- Racial/ethnic makeup
- Religious makeup
- List of cities and towns in the county.
- List of adjacent counties
- County Name - direction to border/optional direction to county
- Note border shared with other country, if exists
- Link back to full list of counties for state
- Start at northernmost point, and move clockwise
- See Jefferson County, Washington for example
- Colleges/Universities in county, Sporting teams in county, similar lists.
- A link to a list of counties in that county's state.
Categorization
Every county should be in at least one category, of the form "StateOrTerritoryName counties" (or "Alaska boroughs", "Alaska census areas", "Louisiana parishes").
About the U.S. county maps
The red and black U.S. county maps are generated from scanned public domain originals, which have then been modified by User:Wapcaplet and User:Jdforrester to indicate the counties and licensed under the GFDL. User:The Anome is uploaded these images using a bot. User:Ram-Man included links to these maps in all of the county articles.
Each of these county maps is credited thus: "Public domain Wikipedia:U.S. county map courtesy of The General Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin (http://www.lib.utexas.edu/), modified to show counties. Released under GFDL."
The page Wikipedia:WikiProject U.S. Counties/checklist has pointers to all of the image filenames, whether they are uploaded yet or not.
The gold maps for Califonia counties and grey maps for Nevada counties were done by User:Brion.
Template for a U.S. County
Don't forget to replace the "_" with the name of the article being converted. For the table, replace the X's with the proper information.
_ is a county in the U.S. state of [[_]].
Introductory paragraph.
History
Main article: History of _
Law and government
Main article: Law and Government of _
Geography
Main article: Geography of _
Geographic features
Major highways
Adjacent counties
- Abc County (north)
- Nop County (northeast)
- Xyz County, across the Deep River (east)
- Def State of Mexico (south)
- Pacific Ocean (west)
Economy
Main article: Economy of _
Demographics
Main article: Demographics of _
Cities and towns
Colleges and universities
Or alternatively use: ==Education== ===Unified school districts=== ===Colleges and universities===