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Sunday 15 December 2013

Capital (Geography)

During the American Revolution, the Pennsylvania city of Lancaster was the capital of the United States for one day, on September 27, 1777, after the Continental Congress fled Philadelphia, which had been captured by the British. The revolutionary government then moved still farther away to York, Pennsylvania.

Lancaster streetscape. By Scanlan - Wikipedia Commons

The commissioners overseeing the construction of a new planned capital of the United States named it Washington, D.C on September 9, 1791, in honor of the country's first president George Washington.

Across all the European countries fighting in World War II, only three national capitals were never occupied: Moscow, London and Helsinki.

Just 0.21% of the U.S. total population live in its capital city, the lowest percentage in the world.

Beijing, Seoul, and Tokyo all mean "capital" in their country's respective languages.

Kyoto, which was the Japanese capital before Tokyo, means "old capital."

La Paz, Bolivia (see below) is the highest capital city in the world.


The average temperature of Mongolia's capital Ulaanbaatar is a chilly -1.7C (29.7F) making it the world’s coldest capital city. It has a January average of -21.6C (-6.5F).

Santa Fe was founded in 1610 as capital of Nuevo México, after it replaced Española as capital. It is now the state capital of New Mexico, making it the oldest state capital in the United States.

Pierre, the capital of South Dakota, is the only state capital name that shares no letters with the name of its state.

The capital of Vermont, Montpelier, is the only state capital in the United States that does not have a McDonalds.

Salt Lake City is the only U.S. state capital with three words in its name.

Juneau, Alaska encompasses 3,255 square miles, making it the most expansive U.S. capital. However, only about 33,000 residents live there.

Nauru is the only state in the world that has no official capital.

South Africa is the only country with three official capitals: Pretoria, Cape Town, and Bloemfontein.

N'Djamena (the capital of Chad), Nuku'alofa (Tonga), Sana'a (Yemen), St John's (Antigua and Barbuda) and St George's (Grenada) are the only capitals with apostrophes in their names.

Trinidad and Tobago is the only country whose capital city is named after another country: Port of Spain.

Source Greatfacts.com

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