Northwest Angle, point of land, c.123 sq mi (319 sq km), N Minnesota, the northernmost point of the coterminous United States and the only place in the United States, outside of Alaska, N of the 49th parallel. Its only land link is with the Canadian province of Manitoba to the west; it is separated from the rest of Minnesota and the Canadian province of Ontario by the Lake of the Woods. The sparsely populated area's northerly location and separation from the rest of Minnesota are the result of treaties and surveying decisions in the late 1700s and early 1800s that were based on poor geographic knowledge.
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