The term "township" actually comes from the Federal Land Survey System. Early in the history of the United States, there was a lot of land that no one was using and the government just wanted to get rid of. The first thing they had to do was catalog what they had, thus the survey system.

• A township is 36 square miles.
• It is divided up into 36 one square mile squares called sections. One square mile is 640 acres.
• A quarter of a section, or a quarter, is 160 acres.
• A quarter of a quarter section, or a quarter-quarter, is 40 acres.

You can also put together two quarter-quarters to make an 1/8th of a section which is 80 acres.