Oklahoma

Oklahoma is a state located in Southern United States. Oklahoma is the 20th most extensive and the 28th most populous of the 50 United States. The state's name is derived from the Choctaw words okla and humma, meaning "red people",. It is also known informally by its nickname, The Sooner State, honoring the European settlers, and the Indian Appropriations Act of 1889 which opened the door for white settlement in America's Indian Territory. The name was settled upon statehood, Oklahoma Territory and Indian Territory were merged and Indian was dropped from the name. On November 16, 1907, Oklahoma became the 46th state to enter the union. Its residents are known as Oklahomans or, informally "Okies", and its capital and largest city is Oklahoma City.
==Geography==
Oklahoma is the 20th-largest state in the United States, covering an area of 69,898 square miles (181,035 km2), with 68,667 square miles (177847 km2) of land and 1,281 square miles (3,188 km2) of water. It is one of six states on the Frontier Strip, and lies partly in the Great Plains near the geographical center of the 48 contiguous states. It is bounded on the east by Arkansas and Missouri, on the north by Kansas, on the northwest by Colorado, on the far west by New Mexico, and on the south and near-west by Texas.
The western edge of the Oklahoma panhandle is out of alignment with its Texas border. The Oklahoma/New Mexico border is actually 2.1 to 2.2 miles east of the Texas line. The border between Texas and New Mexico was set first as a result of a survey by Spain in 1819. It was then set along the 103rd Meridian. In the 1890s, when Oklahoma was formally surveyed using more accurate surveying equipment and techniques, it was discovered that the Texas line was not set along the 103rd Meridian. Surveying techniques were not as accurate in 1819, and the actual 103rd Meridian was approximately 2.2 miles to the east. It was much easier to leave the mistake as it was than for Texas to cede land to New Mexico to correct the original surveying error. The placement of the Oklahoma/New Mexico border represents the true 103rd Meridian.
Cimarron County in Oklahoma's panhandle is the only county in the United States which touches four other states: New Mexico, Texas, Colorado and Kansas (about two miles worth).
==Climate==
Oklahoma is located in a temperate region and experiences occasional extremes of temperature and precipitation typical of a continental climate. Most of the state lies in an area known as Tornado Alley characterized by frequent interaction between cold and warm air masses producing severe weather. An average 54 tornadoes strike the state per year—one of the highest rates in the world.
Because of Oklahoma's position between zones of differing prevailing temperature and winds, weather patterns within the state can vary widely between relatively short distances and can change drastically in a short time. As an example, on November 11, 1911, the temperature at Oklahoma City reached 83 °F (28 °C) in the afternoon (the record high for that date), then an incoming squall line resulted in a drop to 17 °F (−8 °C) at midnight (the record low for that date); thus, both the record high and record low for November 11 were set on the same day. This type of phenomenon is also responsible for many of the tornadoes in the area, such as the 1912 Oklahoma tornado outbreak, when a warm front travelled along a stalled cold front, resulting in an average of about one torando per hour over the course of a day.
The humid subtropical climate (Koppen Cfa) of the eastern part of Oklahoma is influenced heavily by southerly winds bringing moisture from the Gulf of Mexico, but transitions progressively to a semi-arid zone (Koppen BSk) in the high plains of the Panhandle and other western areas from about Lawton westward less frequently touched by southern moisture. Precipitation and temperatures fall from east to west accordingly, with areas in the southeast averaging an annual temperature of 62 °F (17 °C) and an annual rainfall of 56 inches (1,420 mm), while areas of the panhandle average 58 °F (14 °C), with an annual rainfall under 17 inches (430 mm).
All of the state frequently experiences temperatures above 100 °F (38 °C) or below 0 °F (−18 °C), and snowfall ranges from an average of less than 4 inches (10 cm) in the south to just over 20 inches (51 cm) on the border of Colorado in the panhandle. The state is home to the Storm Prediction Center, the National Severe Storms Laboratory, and the Warning Decision Training Branch, all part of the National Weather Service and located in Norman. Oklahoma's highest recorded temperature of 120 °F (49 °C) was recorded at Tipton on June 27, 1994 and the lowest recorded temperature of −31 °F (−35 °C) was recorded at Nowata on February 10, 2011.
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