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Map of the Week: the Saddest Town in America
| January 5, 2012 | Posted by ReubenFB under Map of the Week |
Update 1/16/2012: Turner responds.
Ever wonder which town in America was furthest from a major league team? Well wonder no more, courtesy of Craig Robinson and his beautiful graphic design/baseball site www.flipflopflyball.com.
The website for Turner, Montana does not include this particular factoid, but here are some highlights:
- Turner hosts an annual car show, apparently.
- “Housing several businesses, the town offers a wide range of products and services.”
- Turner Public School has 14 enrolled high school students.
- Turner’s website is run by a non-profit inexplicably called the “Big Flat Community Grain Bin.”
- This non-profit was founded to “work to offset declining populations and funds within our community and school.”
- Turner is actually more depressing than I thought it would be when I started writing this.
Stay tuned for a more upbeat “Map of the Week” next week, and if you want to donate to Big Flat Community Grain Bin please click here.
Apparently, you have never attended a New Year’s Eve party, wedding, or better yet, medical benefit for a community member in Turner, MT. The “14″ High School kids are raised with values and morals, unlike most kids today whose parents spend all their time attending professional baseball games. Instead of our childrens’ parents worrying about the closest professional sport’s stadium to attend, they spend their time attending their own children’s events such as basketball, rodeo, 4-H, and church. I don’t think you should be judging the ‘sadness’ of the small town Turner, instead you should be judging the sadness of your ‘small’ knowledge of America. We still welcome our neighbors with unlocked doors, pray together at the dinner table, and our major league baseball team practices every Wednesday night on the local field during the summer months, ages 2-80! Can you match that?
Sorry you are depressed….something we know little about.
If you knew anything about this community you would take it all back. Wow, some people need better things to do than write things that they know nothing about. Journalism at its finest here!!!
What’s depressing about being the farthest town in the US from a place where MLB is played?
Think about it. Pro baseball is a sport where two teams, each composed of nine whiny, drug-abusing millionaires compete in front of a bunch of empty seats. Who would want to be close to that?
I don’t live in Turner but I don’t live too far from it. Trust me. Having a considerable distance between oneself and what passes for civilization isn’t a bad thing.
I’m with you Mark. Glad to see that Turner and the Big Flat are finally getting the distinction and fame they deserve.
Dude, I dare ya and invite you to come to see how awesome our little community really is! In July, we’ll show you how happy we really are at our Centennial Celebration!!!
Having grown up in Turner I can tell you that we were raised with enough manners to not disrespect a place we’ve never been or people we’ve never met. To think that you can judge a town after looking at a website for 30 seconds is pathetic. Try to show a little more class next time you write an article.
Alaska and Hawai’i?
They apparently didn’t teach you the definition of “contiguous”.
Maybe you shouldn’t judge Turner until you have been there. Have you been there??? I’m sure not other wise you would have a different opinion of it…Maybe you should do some research on when “apparently” their car show or any other event they host is happening and actually come see for yourself. As for I,(and I live on the hi-line but not in Turner) am glad we live the farthest form any major league team! On second thought don’t come to Turner, we don’t need people “like you” around!
I feel you shouldn’t judge a town by professional sports. Seroiusly, are you for really. Get a real job and find out how special our community is. We have real jobs, family values, and we care about our community and town. I truly hate when people make judgements based on geography facts and not about the people who live there and what they care about. Trust me is not about professional sports..
How can you comment on a community if you have never been there. How dare you having never been here!
Having grown up in a small town much like Turner and having friends that live in this particular town, I would say sir, you are wrong. You obviously found some facts on the internet and looked for a little town on a map but have you ever actually been there? I am guessing no. That town like many small towns in this state has more to offer than many major cities. Ya there aren’t any malls or major sports teams but what we have is knowing everyone for miles around, people giving anything and sometimes everything they have to help a neighbor, an entire community that travel miles to watch their high school sports teams, and to top it off more moms and dads that the kids in those towns may want but as we get older we wouldn’t trade ever! So sir I would say that the small town of Turner, Montana as well as any other small town anywhere is far from sad.
I truly believe this sports writer doesn’t have a clue about some towns. We have family values, caring people, and we love our town. To make a judgement like that a person needs to get to know the town and the people.
We may be the farthest from a MLB team, but there is no other place that I would have prefered to have grown up. Turner is a place where your neighbor will give you the shirt off his back, the whole town supports the kids with any activity they do; where you laugh with the parent’s of a new born, cry with the children as they bury a parent and everyone takes pride in any piece of news about someone from their community because it is more than a community, they truly are like family.
Like most US citizens, the author breezily dismisses Hawaii and Alaska.
Don’t judge a town by its cover. You have OBVIOUSLY never been there. Many happy memories have come by being raised in this beautiful community. Shame on you, I think you should make a donation to the Big Flat Community Grain Bin fund so we can be”happier”.
If this has to do with baseball, I’ll have you know that in Turner, MT for 2 months in the summer, parents and children get together twice a week and play baseball. We all have a wonderful time. Some just come to watch, others play but, everyone cheers! Here in Turner we are all major league stars and it doesn’t cost us a dime to have some fun and get together to be an awesome communtiy! Just thought you should know.
Having been born and raised in Turner Montana you are so so wrong on so many levels.
Lol depressing?? I was raised there. Its a great place to raise kids without the crime rate and good down home family values. We may not have had malls, fast food, or a Starbucks. But we had values, and a since of community. Come on down in July as Anna said and see what the community has to offer. What it lacks in population it makes up for in community involvement and heart…
So does that mean that Hogeland isn’t as sad because its closer to a Major League Team.
Okay, obviously he didn’t mean to say that sadness and proximity to a professional baseball field are directly correlated. He just thought the information was interesting, and hoped the followers of his blog thought it would be interesting as well (which we did). I hope you Turnerites understand how difficult it must be to dedicate an entire blog to the combination of sports and geography, and that he did not mean his headline as a slight on your small town values, but to try and make his headline sound more interesting than “Hey look guys, I found a town that’s far away from a baseball stadium”
“I hope you Turnerites understand how difficult it must be to dedicate an entire blog to the combination of sports and geography…”
If that doesn’t say everything that needs to be said about the number of people in this country with too much time on their hands I don’t know what does.
Thanks again, Al Gore, for inventing this great time suck known as the Internet. [/sarcasm]
Yes because dedicating an entire blog about sports and geography is so much more difficult than farming and ranching. Sorry us poor Turnerites dont understand how hard sitting in an office and blogging is.
not only we r turnerites but we also have hutterites who are FRICKEN AWSOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ok seriously he didn’t think anybody would be offended by what he wrote. I just think hes lying to himself if he thinks people wont take it the wrong way. And who would want to have a job where your job is degrading people. thats just wrong. if you you need to go back to school come to turner where you might actually learn something
Hey Paul, what the hell are you trying to say about hogeland?!
Nothing Burt thats where I live. You want to say anything else?
I thought Hogeland should have been mentioned as well. It’s a few miles closer to Seattle but a few miles farther from Denver.
Shhhh, Cindy about the doors being unlocked. I would hate for them to walk in un-announced, I ran out of chips and dip and it’s a long way to the grocery store from our house.
The rest of the US better never forget as well that we’re the first line of defense with Canada. Just be glad we’re here when it really hits the fan.
Since the author notes a place in the website for donations to the town, and since he feels the town is so sad, perhaps he should consider making a healthy donation to improve the situation. Maybe a nice round figure of $1000. That would certainly cause a reduction in sadness.
Maybe the author can help improve the situation in Turner by arranging an exhibition game between the Mariners and Rockies, to be played at the Turner ballfield. The proceeds can then be donated to the Turner website. A MLB game and a donation, that would be real lift for Turner.
This is actually a pretty awesome idea
So sorry buddy. I truly believe you didn’t set out to offend the community of Turner. You have gone and done it… It is pretty hard to put the shit back in the horse.. I wish you better luck with next weeks article. They say we learn by doing and I am guessing you just did!
Some days our small town of turner might be sad. Sad because someones mother, father, daughter or son passed away. then the town of Turner and everyone around for about 40 miles is sad, but to to sad about some stupid major baseball….. I DONT THINK SO. our town just like every other small town usa has heart:). today i am sad because i know theres one more idiot out there that loves to judge and forgets to judge himself…….
Perhaps the article could more accurately be titled “A Town with No Sense of Humor.”
I’m also from a small town in the Northern U.S. that nobody outside of Wisconsin has ever heard of. If some guy wrote some article like this about my hometown, I wouldn’t feel the need to be so self-defensive about it. My hometown speaks for itself. Perhaps you folks should let Turner do the same.
it wasnt the fact that he made a fact about turner being so far away, it was that he said ” this is more depressing then i thought” he could have left that out. i thought it was cool to have someone in new york or where ever write about turner…
Hey, the blogger wasn’t serious any more than my comment about bringing MLB to Turner was serious. Yeah, he had a little fun at your/our expense, but have you considered the possibility that his writing this blog may possibly generate a lot of traffic on the community website? I thought the blog was a hoot.
[...] Nation Divided says that Turner, Montana is the "Saddest Town in America" because it’s the farthest away from a major league baseball team. I’m looking at [...]
You can kiss our country ass. You have no freakin’ idea about our community, and the people who are born and raised here. I suggest that you keep your thoughts to yourself about shit you have no idea about. You should feel shame for your words and your thoughts. Also, you better hope to God you don’t show up in this little community, because you’ll wish you had never come. We could careless about pro-sports, because truly, what morals and values do they teach our young age? Think about it. Next time you sit down to eat a meal, you better say a little prayer and thank the small towns like Turner. We may be small, but we are mighty. We have morals, values, and work ethic. Now as you sit in your office chair overlooking the skyline of smog, high rise buildings, and traffic–think again how “depressing” our community is.
Dear Turnerites: You talk about not judging others when you know nothing about them, but a number of you seem to have no problem judging the author when you clearly haven’t even taken the “30 seconds” you claim he took to look at your website to learn anything about him. Just saying.
For Turnerites (and Hogelanders) still following the comments, we’ve posted a response/apology here:
http://www.sportsnationdivided.com/2012/01/16/map-of-the-week-update-turner-responds/
I’m from Baltimore, a city with a horrible national reputation that is both unfair and yet strangely accurate at the same time. Baltimore’s got a drug problem of a staggering scale, high urban unemployment, and entire blocks of rundown, abandoned buildings. It also has spectacular buildings, wonderful restaurants, incredible schools and hospitals, amazing wealth…and crippling poverty. The reality is, of course, subjective – what you choose to see and what to ignore is what Baltimore is. None of Baltimore’s good points ever made it into yet-another hack Jay Leno monologue, but yet-another jab at how it was a decaying city that made for an easy punchline. Really, Baltimore’s rebound and renovation has been magnified by Detroit’s continuing fall as the standard-bearer of urban blight, which is why Detroit has become the punchline du jour.
For Turnerites to feel as though a single article on a single sports website is this much of a slur to warrant such a reaction is rather funny. Perspective is a wonderful thing.
This just goes to show you…don’t mess with Montana. We may be silent and smiling most of the time, but once you throw something out that insults us, we come back fighting! Hard work and deep pride run through all Montanans’ veins.
I am from a town of 1700 Montana people, and I think the author is an idiot. How dare you attempt to insult something you have obviously never been a part of. A small community has more heart in it than any city that has baseball. WHO CARES!?!?! Find something more productive to write about. Maybe spend some time actually visiting these places you think are so sad. However, I would use a different name because we Montana people stick together. And you insult one of us, you insult all of us. Go Griz:)
i live in California and my mother in law used to live their. And when my kids go their they don’t even think about baseball,because there is so much better things to do then watching drug using baseball players. the kids here get to ride in tractors and to me that is so much better. kids every where else probably don’t do that much. when my son Joe stayed their he saw a kid running a store under supervision though,kids other places probably don’t do that