The opposite of gather() is spread(), which converts a long table into a wide table by converting the values in the key column into column headers, as shown:

 
spread_df <- spread(gathered, "Keys", "Values") 
spread_df # Note that this in essence restores the original look alignment of the table 
 
# # A tibble: 50 x 10 
# Region          Name  Area Frost `HS Grad` Illiteracy Income `Life Exp` Murder Population 
# <fctr>         <chr> <dbl> <dbl>     <dbl>      <dbl>  <dbl>      <dbl>  <dbl>      <dbl> 
#   1 Northeast   Connecticut  4862   139      56.0        1.1   5348      72.48    3.1       3100 
# 2 Northeast         Maine 30920   161      54.7        0.7   3694      70.39    2.7       1058 
# 3 Northeast Massachusetts  7826   103      58.5        1.1   4755      71.83    3.3       5814 
 
## unite 
## The unite function is used to merge two or more variables 
unite(tstate, "NewColumn", "Region","Name") %>% select(NewColumn) 
 
# # A tibble: 50 x 1 
# NewColumn 
# <chr> 
#   1         South_Alabama 
# 2           West_Alaska 
# 3          West_Arizona 
# 4        South_Arkansas