Patchwork Nation

Patchwork Nation, from the Jefferson Institute. This unique site loads quickly and offers a wealth of information for undergraduates seeking demographic information for courses in political science or business and marketing.
Funded by the nonprofit Knight Foundation, this Web site is a reporting project of the Jefferson Institute, ostensibly established to cover the 2008 election. Patchwork Nation examines communities over time via demographic, voting, and cultural data. It has created 12 organizational clusters, e.g., Boom Towns, Evangelical Epicenters, Mormon Outposts, Monied "Burbs, Military Bastions, and Tractor Country. The project uses data from the 2000 US Census and 2006 estimates of common census items at the county level. Religious data come from the Glenmary Research Center's "Survey of Religious Congregations in America, 2000." Patchwork Nation makes its data and methodology available for those who wish to mine or replicate results. It explains limitations to data, e.g., measures of county size, median income averages, and inferences about behavior within places and counties.
 R. Tolley-Stokes, East Tennessee State University. Reviewed in Nov 2011 CHOICE.