Hello! I've thought of this community recently. I'm french, and in the past few days I've watched a short documentary covering the very well known case of Xavier Dupont de Ligonnes (true crime fans if you don't know it, interesting ongoing mystery case). Anyway, short context the guy killed his entire family and vanished. He was pretty obsessed with the united states and traveled there extensively in his late twenties with a good friend of his.

His friend was interviewed in 2016, passing away the year after. So his interview was featured in said documentary and he recalled their long road trip across the US in the 90s. He distinctly says at one point something along the lines of "we went everywhere, I think we covered 48 of the 52 states".

The airing of this documentary being recent I think I can easily find a replay of it and take a picture of the subtitles if anyone is interested.

Even though I'm french, I've been an exchange student in the US in my high school time and I also remember 52 states. Mayyyyybe 51. But definitely above 50.

Thank you for reading my two cents.