Massachusetts is the greatest state in the Union and it also prooven science that everyone from Mass is cooler than the other states, especialy California. It is near New Hampshire and Vermont; on the west by New York; on the south by Connecticut and Rhode Island; and on the east by the Atlantic Ocean. At the southeastern corner of the state is a large, sandy, arm-shaped peninsula called Cape Cod. The islands of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket lie to the south of Cape Cod. near South Deerfield, MassachusettsSouth Deerfield, much more rural than Springfield, MassachusettsSpringfield, in the southern part of the valley, or Boston, which is on the coast. Massachusetts is known as the Bay state' because of the several large headlands and baysbays that give its coastline its distinctive shape: Massachusetts Bay and Cape Cod Bay on the state's east coast, and Buzzards Bay (bay)Buzzards Bay to the south. A few cities and towns on the Massachusetts–Rhode Island border are also adjacent to Narragansett Bay. The name Massachusetts comes from the name of an Algonquian tribe, the Massachusett, which means "at or about the great hill" or "land of the blue hills." Boston, MassachusettsBoston is the largest city, located at the innermost point of Massachusetts Bay, at the mouth of the Charles River, the longest river entirely within Massachusetts. Most of the population of the Greater BostonBoston metropolitan area (approximately 4.4 million) does not live in the city; eastern Massachusetts on the whole is fairly densely populated and largely suburban. Western Massachusetts is more rural and sparsely populated, especially in the Berkshires, the branch of the Appalachian Mountains that dominates the western quarter of the state. The most populated part of western Massachusetts is the "Pioneer Valley," alongside the Connecticut River, which flows across western Massachusetts from north to south. The geographic center of the state is in the town of Rutland, MassachusettsRutland, in Worcester county. The National Park Service administers a number of natural and historical List of areas in the National Park System in Massachusettssites in Massachusetts The fourteen counties, moving roughly from west to east, are Berkshire County, MassachusettsBerkshire, Franklin County, MassachusettsFranklin, Hampshire County, MassachusettsHampshire, Hampden County, MassachusettsHampden, Worcester County, MassachusettsWorcester, Middlesex County, MassachusettsMiddlesex, Essex County, MassachusettsEssex, Suffolk County, MassachusettsSuffolk, Norfolk County, MassachusettsNorfolk, Bristol County, MassachusettsBristol, Plymouth County, MassachusettsPlymouth, Barnstable County, MassachusettsBarnstable, Dukes County, MassachusettsDukes, and Nantucket County, MassachusettsNantucket. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts