[texhax] Trivial in Plain TeX---what about LaTeX?

[Michael Doob]

Here's the problem: you have a one-page document with short bit of text
and a footnote. You don't want to have a big gap between the text and
the footnote, so you want to shorten the page so that the footnote
follows the text directly. Here is a trivial solution using Plain Tex:

   \font\sf=cmss8

   The City of Winnipeg\footnote{$^1$}{This information can be found at
   {\sf http://www.winnipeg.ca}} is located at the junction of the Red and
   Assiniboine Rivers, almost at the geographic centre of North America.
   Winnipeg is situated in Latitude 49 degrees 54 minutes North, Longitude
   97 degrees 8 minutes West, 64 km south of Lake Winnipeg and 97 km north
   of the boundary line between Canada and the United States of America,
   almost midway between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and at an
   altitude of 232 m above the seaboard level of New York.

   \bigskip
   \vsize=\pagetotal
   \bye

So now we start with the equivalent LaTeX problem:

   \documentclass{article}
   \begin{document}
   
   The City of Winnipeg\footnote{This information can be found at
   \textsf{http://www.winnipeg.ca}} is located at the junction of the Red
   and Assiniboine Rivers, almost at the geographic centre of North
   America. Winnipeg is situated in Latitude 49 degrees 54 minutes North,
   Longitude 97 degrees 8 minutes West, 64 km south of Lake Winnipeg and
   97 km north of the boundary line between Canada and the United States
   of America, almost midway between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and
   at an altitude of 232 m above the seaboard level of New York.
   
   \end{document}

I do have a solution that is just too ugly to show. In addition, 
there is probably some solution to be had that, by its elegance,
will embarrass me by my display of ignorance.

Any good ideas?

Cheers,
Michael

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Michael Doob                    Telephone: (204) 474-9796
Department of Mathematics       Fax: (204) 474-7606
University of Manitoba          email: Michael_Doob at umanitoba.ca
Winnipeg, MB, Canada R3T 2N2
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