Subject: Geographic centers
Date: Dec 10, 2000 @ 04:46
Author: Jack Parsell ("Jack Parsell" <jparsell@gisco.net>)
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The discussion re how to find the center of an area reminded me
of the attached article from the Lyons, KS paper which somebody
sent to me a long time ago.  On our midwestern trip 2 months ago
we visited this location and found a small fenced area with a metal
fence post in the center.  No signs or markings and no one home
at the nearby farm house.
Using the method of averaging geocoordinates of the four corners
of Kansas put me about 17 miles west of the point shown in the
newspaper article.  The northeast corner of KS follows the Missouri
R. and this introduces a significant error into this method of calculating
the center.  It should work very well, as David points out, for rectangles
like Colorado or Wyoming. 
David's method in message 1032 should be much more accurate but 
very  tedious to calculate.  It seems to me that sherical geometry must
be involved in order to avoid the problem that Jesper found in trying to
locate the center of N. America on a flat map. 
Do we have any mathemeticians in the crowd who can solve this problem?