The world's largest tropical rainforest.

It covers much of northwestern Brazil, as well as parts of Columbia, Peru, and other South American countries. The Amazon river, as well as thousands of others, passes through it.

It it referred to as the Earth's lungs because its trees absorb greenhouse gases from the air and creates 5 percent of the planet's oxygen.

Region in northeast Alaska that is the country's largest wildlife refuge. It is one of the most pristine ecosystems on Earth.

It is home to polar bears, migratory birds, and caribou.

It also is considered to be rich in oil.

For more, read the National Geographic story.

Website: www.fws.gov/refuge/arctic

Eastern European country that had been part of the former Soviet Union.

A peninsula in the Black Sea just south of Ukraine and west of Russia.



A simple history of Crimea's national affiliation...

For more on Crimea, read this Bloomberg story.

For more on the political situation in Crimea, read this BBC story.

For a perspective on why Russia annexed Crimea, read this Foreign Affairs analysis.

Palestinian territory located in the western part of Israel bordering the Mediterranean Sea

Tens of thousands of Palestinians who were living in what now is Israel settled in Gaza in 1948 after Israel became an independent nation.

A group of five large freshwater lakes on the United States - Canada border. They contain a fifth of the Earth's surface fresh water.

The lakes are..

A sheet of ice covering most of Greenland. It is the second largest body of ice on Earth (the largest is the Antartic ice sheet).

It contains almost 10 percent of all the Earth's fresh water.

Its average thickness is 1.5 miles. If melted, it would cause the sea level to rise more than 20 feet.

Click here for more on the Greenland Ice Sheet.

(Coming)

Building in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were debated and adopted.

Donald Trump's luxury resort in Florida.

As president, Trump has routinely used Mar-a-Lago to host official visitors or perform other official U.S. business.

Website: www.MaralagoClub.com.

An area recognized by the U.S. government that memorializes a historic person or event. Most are managed by National Park Service (NPS).

National memorial in South Dakota.

The focus of the memorial is the carvings on the mountain of presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln.

It was built in the early 1900s to attract tourism to the state - on land illegally taken from the Sioux Nation.


NewsInFiVe chief Barry Shatzman with his son Gabriel (now a sergeant in the U.S Air Force) at Mt. Rushmore in 2003.

An area of land - considered to be of archeological, scientific, or historic interest - owned by and protected by the federal government.

The 1906 Antiquities Act gave the president the authority to designate federal lands as national monuments.

They are similar to national parks, except national parks are designated by Congress.

Lands designated as national monuments cannot be leased for activities such as mining, drilling, logging, or ranching. However, if these activities were taking place at the time a president declares the land a national monument, they normally can continue.


Data Source: National Parks Conservation Association (via fivethirtyeight.com)

A 1.35 million acre area in Utah. Indigenous people lived on the land for thousands of years, leaving artifacts that date back 5,000 years. It also is a recreational visitor attraction.

Bear Ears also leases land for grazing and oil and gas extraction.

In Dec. 2016, President Barack Obama invoked the Antiquities Act to designate it a national monument. That means existing leases can continue, but no new leases can be issued.

In 2016, Rep. Rob Bishop introduced an alternative plan that would allow for mineral extraction, energy development, and road construction at Bears Ears.

For a local look at Bears Ears National Monument, read this Telluride News story.

A national monument in Utah.

It was established in 1996 by President Bill Clinton under the 1906 Antiquities Act.

Click here for a look at Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

An area set aside by the federal government for conservation.

National parks are designated by Congress, as opposed to national monuments, which are designated by a president.

U.S. commonwealth consisting of 14 islands in the Pacific Ocean.


Source: Google Maps

For more, visit the Department of the Interior website.
Website: www.gov.mp.

The Union of Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR) - or Soviet Union for short - was a nation comprised of several nations that it had appropriated.

It existed from 1922 to 1991.

Its nations, along with Russia, were...

For more, vist www.WorldAtlas.com.

A condominium and office skyscraper in New York.

It is the private residence of Donald Trump, as well as the main office of his businesses.

Eastern European country that had been part of the former Soviet Union.



In 1991 it became an independent country again. It has since gone through periods when its policies were more aligned with Russia, and others where its policies were more aligned with western Europe and the United States.

The delta of the Yazoo River between the Yazoo and Mississippi rivers. It also is referred to as the Mississippi Delta.

It consists of the northwest section of Mississippi and parts of Arkansas and Louisiana.

Due to a combination of factors aggravated by Global Warming, flooding has made the delta among the fastest-disappearing lands on Earth.

For more about the delta, including its history , read the Southern Spaces article.