Phantom Geography Persists

Agloe, New York was invented by cartographers to catch plagiarists. When a general store later opened at that location and named itself Agloe, the fiction became reality.

The Mountains of Kong appeared on maps of West Africa for nearly a century (1798-1892) despite never existing. One mapmaker drew them, and others copied rather than verified. French explorer Louis-Gustave Binger walked the region on his 1889 expedition and proved it was flat savanna.

Even modern digital maps contain deliberate errors called trap streets — fictitious roads inserted to identify copyright theft. If a competitor includes your fake street, you have proof of copying.