Official Michigan Map Hid Ohio Rivalry Easter Eggs With Fake Town Names

It's well documented that Michigan and Ohio have a rivalry unlike almost anyone else in the country. And while you'll hear a few Michigan and Ohio natives toss insults at each other once in a while, the REAL heart of this hatred stems from one thing - Football.

The Michigan/Ohio Rivalry is unmatched. Even people living in each state, who AREN'T regular fans of the teams will still root for their home turf during this border battle game, and the trash talking and shade knows no depths. In fact, one act of Michigan fandom was SO devious, it went unnoticed for years, and it was literally right in front of our faces any time we needed to know where to go in the state of Michigan.

Peter Fletcher is a former chair of the Michigan State Highway Commission, and in the 1970s, he was tasked with creating a new road map of Michigan. He was asked to make it as detailed as possible, so he put together the best team of cartographers he could to get the job done.

But he had one special task for one cartographer who would be working closely along the Ohio border.

While including the fringes of Ohio on our southeast borders on the map, Fletcher instructed his cartographer to include two fictitious towns to trash talk the Buckeyes.

• "beatosu" was located just across the state line, along Interstates 80/90, just north of the REAL town of Burlington, Ohio.
• "goblu" was on Ohio State Highway 2, just east of the real town of Oregon, Ohio, just outside of Toledo

Keeping in mind, this map, created in 1978 was an OFFICIAL Michigan State Map, meaning this would be the map that all Michiganders would use, with the latest in updated roads and highways.

According to legend, when the cartographer of the map was asked about adding the towns in, he said, "My duty was to make as accurate a map of Michigan as I could... it said nothing about Ohio."

By the way, it probably goes without saying that Peter Fletcher was a HUGE Michigan fan, which is why he decided to put it in the map, but also, this being 1978, it happened to be released during the 10-year "Border War" with Ohio State, featuring Bo Schembechler and Woody Hayes. Michigan also beat OSU 14-3 the year this map came out.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Dearborn Historical Museum (@dearbornhistoricalmuseum)