Introduction
While researching institutions of different types, including academic and higher educational institutions, fairgrounds, museums, art galleries, art centers, stadiums, and even a few corporate campuses associated with the cultural traits of certain areas, novaTopFlex has identified numerous locations with shared interests and values across regions, including the following regions, which will be discussed in more detail below:
- The Northeast Megalopolis
- Rural New England
- Upper New York
- Chicagoland
- Minneapolis–St. Paul (Twin Cities)
Northeast Megalopolis
Throughout the Northeast Megalopolis, numerous higher educational institutions, often elite, are of significant cultural influence to the region, even for individuals and communities not associated with such institutions. Numerous philosophers from Ivy League universities, including Harvard, Yale, Brown, Darmouth, UPenn, Princeton, Columbia, and Cornell*, have influenced not just the regional culture, but the cultural traits of the entire nation at large, even beyond just the East Coast. While such prestige outside the Ivy League is typically associated with the Pacific, including Hawaii, surprising prestigious values may also exist in scattered locations across the nation.
*Cornell is not located in the Northeast Megalopolis. Cornell University has facilities beyond the main campus in Ithaca, Tompkins County, New York; however, the facilities located in New York City, and thus the Northeast Megalopolis, are not considered the core of the University. Otherwise, the Ivy League is located entirely located within the Northeast Megalopolis.
Even beyond the world-class Ivy League institutions, numerous additional institutions scattered throughout the region, including the campuses of the City University of New York (CUNY) and the downstate campuses of the State University of New York (SUNY); numerous institutions within the Philadelphia Metropolitan Area, including Bryn Mawr, Valley Forge, and Swarthmore; institutions in the Boston area such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Tufts; and the Five Colleges of Western Massachusetts, have largely influenced societal norms throughout the region, resulting in a more progressive worldview compared to the vast majority of the nation outside the Megalopolis.
In several cases, particularly in the State of New Jersey, even public institutions can be just as influential as the world-class Ivy League institutions, even without officially being included within the Ivy League designation. Examples of such institutions include Montclair State University and Rutgers University, the latter of whose main campus is in New Brunswick in Middlesex County. Outside New Jersey, additional public institutions that exist with cultural influence include the aforementioned CUNY and SUNY systems of New York and the UMass and UConn systems of Massachusetts and Connecticut, respectively.
Rural New England
While the Northeast Megalopolis largely determines the cultural traits of the coastal regions of Southern New England, much of the Northern New England region is comparatively less developed and more forested. While even Massachusetts maintains environmentalist principles even within the urban areas of the Commonwealth, resulting in the state ranking as among the most forested in the nation, the more rural Northern New England states are often less developed and more forested as a result. Vermont, renowned for sprawl-mitigating Act 250, often sets the example for what society often prefers, where compact, dense, walkable small cities and especially towns dominate the lifestyle of the State. While the Northern New England cities and towns often set environmentalist examples for society as a whole, each of the three states is set up somewhat differently. If Vermont is renowned for the Green Mountains, then New Hampshire is renowned for the White Mountains and Maine is renowned for Mount Katahdin at Baxter State Park as well as for the lengthy coastline of the State. Throughout the region, colleges and universities of all shapes and sizes often change the cultural realities and perception, with notable examples being Plymouth State University in New Hampshire; UVM and the four campuses of Vermont State University in Vermont; and numerous, often smaller, institutions in the State of Maine, just to name public institutions. Private institutions also play a large role in changing the culture of the region, with the Town of Putney, located between the Town of Brattleboro and the Village of Bellows Falls within the Town of Rockingham in Windham County, Vermont, being renowned for supporting the autistic and related communities of the region and beyond (by way of Landmark College). Outside Putney, however, are additional institutions of cultural and often historical significance including Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine; and Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont, just to name two.
Notable features of natural interest in Northern New England include not just the mountains of the region, but also the lakes, as in Lake Winnipesaukee, the largest lake in New Hampshire. Furthermore, the State of Maine contains among the longest coastlines in the United States of America, dependent on shore length measurements as shore length can never be a well-defined measure, thanks to being the only East Coast state where mountains dive directly into the ocean, with numerous islands along the seacoast, including islands near Rockland, Maine, associated with state-level artists, as well as perhaps more famous artists nearer the Isles of Shoals in such places as Kennebunk, Kennebunkport, York, Saco, Biddeford, Yarmouth, and Portland. Vermont, the only landlocked state in the region, is also highly renowned for quaint shops and stores unique to the State, which tends to focus on more local amenities to insulate from corporate encroachment into the region that would often largely violate Act 250.
Within Vermont specifically, research has identified the Tunbridge World’s Fair in Tunbridge, Orange County, Vermont; the Vermont State Fair in the City of Rutland, Rutland County, Vermont; and the Vermont SummerFest/HITS Vermont along U.S. Route 7 in Dorset, Bennington County, Vermont, to be of cultural significance to local Vermonters, while tourists, particularly ski tourists, should benefit from the Stowe Mountain Resort in the north of the state and the Killington Resort in the south of the state, both along the state-renowned Route 100.
Upper New York
Much of what society has identified as “Upstate” New York contains cultural traits very similar to the aforementioned urban Northeast Megalopolis culture in urban areas and to the aforementioned rural New England culture in rural areas. While the City of Albany is the capital city of the State of New York and a historically significant inland port city along the Hudson River, as the river is a tidal estuary as far north as Troy in Rensselaer County, additional Upstate cities with significant influence on the regional culture include Buffalo in the west along Lake Erie and the Niagara River, Rochester along Lake Ontario, Syracuse in the central part of the State, Utica near Oneida Lake, Watertown in the North Country, and the Southern Tier cities of Elmira, Corning, and Binghamton. Closer up to the Hudson River and the cultural orbit of Albany is also the communities of Schenectady, Kingston, Catskill, Hudson, Coxsackie, Poughkeepsie, Newburgh, and Beacon–nearly all of which are located further downstream toward New York City. Even further north along the Hudson River is Glens Falls, followed shortly by the Adirondack Mountains which contain the source of the Hudson River. Additional information about the cultural aspects of the State of New York can be found on previous articles specific to the State as well as on potential future articles, the futoTopFlex channel on YouTube, and external sources.
Chicagoland
The Chicago region, spanning most of southern Lake Michigan from northeast Illinois into northwest Indiana, is of significant cultural influence to the Midwest region as a whole. While different states in the Midwestern United States and especially the Great Lakes region are comprised of numerous distinct microcultures in addition to the Midwestern macroculture, the Chicago region, whether the inner city or the vast suburban stretches of the region, is highly renowned for producing the most vibrant cultural scene in the Midwestern United States, influencing even independent cities in Wisconsin nearby, such as Kenosha, Racine, and Milwaukee. Unlike the Northeast Megalopolis, however, the Chicago region is not nearly as significant an influence outside the North American continent, even though the city is often identified as a global city from the perspectives of other continents and Chicago O’Hare International Airport is a world-class international hub.
Even outside Chicagoland, numerous smaller Midwestern cities also contain cultural similarities with the Chicago region, albeit at a smaller scale. Perhaps the most similar Midwestern city to Chicago is Columbus, Ohio, as the latter is the third-largest state capital city in the nation while also containing The Ohio State University, also the third-largest public state university in the nation. While Chicago does not contain nearly the same scale of university life within a single college or university, public or private, nor even the state capital role for the state the city is located in (Illinois, where Springfield serves the role of state capital), the role of the city and inner suburban areas of Columbus is very similar to numerous roles of Chicagoland.
Minneapolis–St. Paul (Twin Cities)
Within the Minneapolis–St. Paul region, numerous cultural traits exist that augment the identity of the Upper Midwest, including a diverse array of colleges including the public University of Minnesota and Minnesota State systems as well as private institutions such as Augsburg, Macalester, St. Olaf, and Carleton. Apart from the diverse range of colleges and universities, of which Carleton is particularly prestigious and perhaps the most prestigious in the Midwest, the Twin Cities region is also home to the Minnesota State Fair, located approximately midway between the downtown areas of Minneapolis and St. Paul. Interestingly, although the Texas State Fair is the largest state fair by total attendance overall each year, the Minnesota State Fair typically serves the largest daily total each year, since the Minnesota fair lasts for only twelve days ending on Labor Day each year while the Texas fair (in Dallas) typically occurs for twenty-four days from late September until mid-October.