Introduction
While the vast majority of counties in the United States have obviously defined county seats, a number are actually out of the ordinary in a number of respects, including, but not limited to, the consolidated city-county and town-county arrangements and the independent cities. Each county mentioned below contains a relatively lower population count relative to other counties in the United States of America as a whole, and the communities are typically situated in the Great Plains states, where the land area of counties remains relatively similar to the land areas represented in counties further east.
Selected Counties
Slope County is located in the southwestern portion of the State of North Dakota, with only one county, Bowman, located further south. Amidon serves as the county seat of Slope County, though the community does not represent the largest area in the county or region. However, the county is accessible by way of United States Route 85, which merely expands the geographical anomaly as the U.S. Numbered Highways in the Great Plains region often represent the larger communities of the respective corridors.
Blaine County, Nebraska, located in the Sandhills region associated with the State, is the second-smallest county by population in the entire State and often represented in the bottom twenty-five (25) of counties in the United States by population count. The City of Brewster, a community of only around seventeen (17) residents, serves as the county seat, resulting in the community being representative of the least populated incorporated county seat in the United States of America, a role that had been taken by Amidon prior to the 2010 census. Today, the community is accessible primarily by Routes 7 and 91, with the former leading exclusively northward toward the City of Ainsworth, the Brown County seat with under two thousand residents. The latter leads both to the east and to the west, and Route 183 is within the easterly vicinity of the community.
Loving County, located within the West Texas region beyond the Permian Basin in the State of Texas, is home to the fewest residents of all counties in the United States containing a permanent population, with recent estimates around sixty-four (64) residents for the entire county. The only community within the county is the unincorporated community of Mentone, having recorded around nineteen (19) of the residents of the county, which itself is accessible in the state highway network exclusively by way of Route 302 east of United States Route 285 and south of the New Mexico state line.
Within Buffalo County, South Dakota, the situation may appear even more confusing initially, as the communities East River are often identified as more humid and with higher rural base populations than West River. However, this specific East River county, located relatively downstream from the City of Pierre in Hughes County, is identified as a county with a population of fewer than two thousand residents. Gann Valley is an unincorporated community located on the eastern side of the county whose population makes the area the least populated unincorporated county seat in the United States.
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