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What in the World? A New Game from the Geography and Map Division

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Today’s guest post is by Hannah Stahl, a Library Technician in the Geography and Map Division. Hannah received her undergraduate degree with honors in English and a minor in Medieval and Renaissance Studies from the University at Albany, SUNY. Her first exposure to the Geography and Map Division was as an intern, where she worked part-time on a cartobibliography of maps of France and Belgium. Currently, Hannah is the primary content author for the Division’s Twitter account. She is working on her Master’s in Library Science at Simmons College.

Hello, map lovers!

The Geography and Map Division announces a new game that will be played on our Twitter feed starting later this month. Inspired by the British Library’s “Guess the Manuscript” game, this new game is called “What in the World?”

Map from 1611 by Jodocus Hondius, which shows the Strait of Magellan and the coasts of Chile and Argentina.
Map from 1611 by Jodocus Hondius, which shows the Strait of Magellan and the coasts of Chile and Argentina. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress.

How it Works

1. The Geography and Map Division will post a detail of an image from a map that we have in our digital collection on Twitter (@LOCMaps).

whatintheworld_map_exampledetail
Detail of map by Jodocus Hondius

2. It is your mission to hunt down this map and provide us with the link to the map you think the detail is from. You can do this by going to the Library of Congress’ website and and clicking on the “maps” tile.

Clicking on this tile will bring you to our “Collections with Maps”  (http://www.loc.gov/maps/collections/) page, where you can begin your hunt for the map.
Clicking on this tile will bring you to our “Collections with Maps” page, where you can begin your hunt for the map.
loc_homepage_mapformat
You can also search for maps on the Library of Congress homepage by changing the format option in the search bar to “Maps” and clicking “Go.”
Using this search option will bring up all of the maps we have available online.
Using this search option will bring up all of the maps we have available online.

3. Once you think you’ve found the right map, tweet at us with the link to the map.

Example: “@LOCMaps, I think the What in the World map is this one: http://www.loc.gov/item/2010592453/

4. The first person to guess correctly is named “Monarch of the Maps” until the next round of the game. Then, the Monarch has to defend their title by being the first to guess during the next round. How long do you think you can hold onto the crown? Winners and the correct answer will be posted a week from when the contest starts:

Example: “The map from this round of What in the World was by Jodocus Hondius: http://www.loc.gov/item/2010592453

Example: “Congratulations @Maplover22! You are the Monarch of the Maps!”

Sound fun? Be on the lookout for the first round of “What in the World” later on in the month. Make sure that you’re following @LOCMaps on Twitter!

Comments (4)

  1. Hi,
    This looks like fun but what about those of us who do not use Twitter? Is there a way we could play?
    Nancy

    • Good point, Nancy. We’ll look into that.

  2. A great followup to announcing the ‘monarch’ is to offer a ‘search tip’. This would educate all involved on researching techniques.

    • Nice idea! Thanks for the suggestion.

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