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Palmyra Atoll
The only incorporated territory of the United States
Palmyra is a ring of about two dozen palm-covered islets around shallow lagoons, roughly 1,000 miles south of Hawaii, with a legal status no other place shares. It is the only incorporated territory of the United States, which means the Constitution applies there in full. Palmyra came under the U.S. flag along with Hawaii, and when Hawaii became a state in 1959 the atoll was left out, remaining federal land with no local government at all.
The Navy built an air station there during World War II, dredging channels and reducing the number of islets from 52 to about 25. Today most of the atoll is owned by The Nature Conservancy, which bought it in 2000, while the surrounding waters form a national wildlife refuge. Soaked by around 175 inches of rain a year, Palmyra hosts a research station that studies coral reefs and seabirds and has tracked the island's recovery since invasive rats were removed.