Ask Mapman
Ar
M
ap m
an
ou
n
d
t he W
or
ld W i t h
Can you stump our cartographer?
Midway Islands are now part of the
Northwestern Hawaiian Islands
Marine National Monument.
Midway Is.
U.S.
PACIFIC
OCEAN
Northern
Mariana Is.
Puerto Rico
U.S. Virgin Is.
Caribbean
Guam
Navassa Sea
Island
American Samoa
American Samoans are
passionate about football.
More than 30 athletes of
Samoan descent play in
the NFL.
Located to the east
of the Mariana Islands,
the Mariana Trench is
the deepest part of
the world’s oceans.
EQUATOR
ATLANTIC
OCEAN
Commonwealth
Territory*
* Not all U.S. territories are labeled on map.
Source: The World Factbook 2010 (CIA)
map: jim mcmahon/mapman™
A JS reader asks:
Where are the U.S.
territories located?
T
he United States has 14 territories, all located in the
Pacific Ocean and Caribbean
Sea (see map). Only five of the
­territories are inhabited: American
Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana
Islands, Puerto Rico, and the U.S.
Virgin Islands. Even though most
of the residents of the territories
are U.S. citizens, they cannot vote
in U.S. presidential elections.
Two of the territories, Northern
Mariana Islands and Puerto Rico,
maintain a commonwealth status.
This gives them more self-governing
power than the other territories,
as well as the right to vote for or
against independence from the U.S.
What is life like in the uninhabited territories? Most of these
tiny islands are atolls and reefs.
A few years ago, I traveled to
­Midway Islands in the North Pacific
Ocean. The site of an important
naval battle during World War II,
­Midway is now home to gooney
birds, monk seals, and Hawaiian
green sea turtles. The U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service keeps a few
­rangers there to protect the island’s
animals from ­commercial fishing
nets, disease, and each other.
—Jim McMahon, aka Mapman
Do you have a geography question for Mapman™? Send your e-mail to him at
[email protected]. If we publish your question, you will receive a free JS T-shirt!
october 25/november 8, 2010 • JUNIOR SCHOLASTIC online reproducible
Uses: copy machine, opaque projector, or transparency master for overhead projector. Scholastic Inc. grants teacher-subscribers to Junior Scholastic permission to reproduce this Skills Reproducible for use in their classrooms. Copyright © 2010 by Scholastic Inc. All rights reserved.
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