Not the map I’ve been looking for, but close. The time frame is right:
In the 1970s, geography professor C. Etzel Pearcy proposed redrawing the borders of the US states, reducing them from 50 to 38. Each new state’s name was chosen to represent a physical of cultural aspect of each new territory. This realignment was supposed to be more ‘organic’ and more logical, as major population centres such as Kansas City would no longer be located in two different states. Needless to say, the idea never left the drawing board.