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Archive: 2017 (37 Posts)

Brown, red, and yellow tinted map illustration of the continents of Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia, with a circular frame around them

Modest Monuments: The District of Columbia Boundary Stones

Posted by: Tim St. Onge

The oldest set of federally placed monuments in the United States are strewn along busy streets, hidden in dense forests, lying unassumingly in residential front yards and church parking lots. Many are fortified by small iron fences, and one resides in the sea wall of a Potomac River lighthouse. Lining the current and former boundaries …

Brown, red, and yellow tinted map illustration of the continents of Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia, with a circular frame around them

Places in Civil War History: Tennessee Secession and Fortress Monroe

Posted by: Ed Redmond

This is a series of posts documenting the cartographic history of maps related to the American Civil War, 1861-1865. The posts will appear on a regular basis. In May 1861, several more states formally seceded from the Union and joined the Confederate States of America, including Tennessee on May 16th and Virginia on May 23rd. …

Brown, red, and yellow tinted map illustration of the continents of Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia, with a circular frame around them

Places in Civil War History: Fort Sumter and Virginia Secession

Posted by: Ed Redmond

This is a series of posts documenting the cartographic history of maps related to the American Civil War, 1861-1865. The posts will appear on a regular basis. On April 12, 1861, the first salvos of the American Civil War were fired with the bombardment of Fort Sumter, situated in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina, by Confederate …

Brown, red, and yellow tinted map illustration of the continents of Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia, with a circular frame around them

Places in American Civil War History: Preparation for War

Posted by: Ed Redmond

This is a series of posts documenting the cartographic history of maps related to the American Civil War, 1861-1865. The posts will appear on a regular basis. On the eve of the Civil War, few detailed maps existed of areas in which fighting was likely to occur. Uniform, large-scale topographic maps, such as those produced …

•Map Caption: S. Liebmann’s Sons Brewing Co. of Brooklyn, New York boasts of “61 years of Scientific Progress Brewing” (New York: 1915, Rand McNally). Map depicts Jersey City, New Jersey. From the Geography and Map Division Titled Collection.

WWI-Era Terrorism: Black Tom Island and Anti-German Hysteria

Posted by: Ryan Moore

The German act of terrorism on Black Tom Island was one of a series of events that came to a head with the infamous Zimmermann Telegram and pushed America to declare war on Germany in April 1917.  These hostile acts fueled anti-German hysteria that was so great that nearly all aspects of life associated with …

Brown, red, and yellow tinted map illustration of the continents of Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia, with a circular frame around them

Places in American Civil War History: Maps Depicting Prologue to War and Secession, March 1861

Posted by: Ed Redmond

This is the first of a series of posts documenting the cartographic history of maps related to the American Civil War, 1861-1865. The posts will appear on a regular basis. The first post will provide on overview of pre-war mapping, and maps depicting secession. Following posts will proceed chronologically from the first shots fired at …

Philip Lee Phillips, Reluctant Ambassador to King of Maps: The Story Behind the First Superintendent of Maps at the Library of Congress

Posted by: Ryan Moore

Phillips, for all his notoriety, was not trained as a professional librarian and early in his career, he served as a reluctant, unconfident ambassador for the Library in meeting map vendors, according to Manuscript Division specialist Cheryl Fox. Fox shared her research on Phillips in a February 22nd lecture sponsored by the Philip Lee Phillips …

"Special Map Showing Contact Between Gen. Hodges' First U.S. Army and Gen. Jadov's Fifth U.S.S.R. Army, 25 April 1945." 654th Engineer Topographic Battalion, April 1945. Bob Crozier World War II military intelligence map and aerial photograph collection, Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress.

The Bob Crozier Collection: Aerial Reconnaissance in World War II

Posted by: Ryan Moore

Bob Crozier served as a Technical Sergeant in the 654th Topographic Engineers from 1943 to 1946. Crozier was part of the American First Army under General Omar Bradley. He donated a collection of photos and maps created during World War II to the Geography and Map Division. The collection consists of a 36-page booklet that …