By Mari Radtke
On Friday during the blackout in Sutherland, I received a text from O’Brien County Economic Development Director Kiana Johnson. O’Brien County, Iowa now can officially boast being a Jeopardy! statement. She sent a photo of the image on TV. The photo was taken by a “Travel Iowa” official’s mother. It was quickly shared all the way to Johnson who said she was certainly going to promote O’Brien County being a Jeopardy! answer. Although it’s not yet clear what the question was.
O’Brien County Supervisor and former County Auditor Barb Rohwer said her office was contacted by Jeopardy! representatives in late November verifying the measurement. Given the spherical shape of the earth that much perfect geometry is stunning. As Barb said, “Unless you are a flat-earther.”
The statement reads, “O’Brien County, Iowa is a perfect square. This many miles each side for a total of 576 very square miles.”
I can’t tell you what math to use to turn into a question, but knowing the county has 16 equally sized townships, I divided the 576 by the 16 to come up with each O’Brien County border being 34.125 linear miles. Maybe our County Engineer has a better answer!