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Franklin D. Roosevelt being presented a globe by the United States Army at the White House in Washington, D.C. Photo, December 1942. Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library.

The President’s Globe

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The “President’s Globe” is big — really big and important. Weighing in at a whopping 750 pounds and sized at an impressive 50 inches in diameter, the globe was specially designed for President Franklin D. Roosevelt for use during World War II. The massive representation of the earth helped the president gauge distances over water to allocate personnel and material in support of the war effort against the Axis Powers of Germany, Japan, and Italy. This feat of cartographic history was given as a Christmas present to the president in 1942, and he placed the globe directly behind his office chair, often referring to it during his workday.

Military Globe by United States Office of Strategic Services, c1942. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress.
[Military globe] by United States Office of Strategic Services and Weber Costello Co., c1942. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress.
A matching globe was created for British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and a third for General George C. Marshall, the Chief of Staff of the United States Army. Each man used his globe as a reference point when communicating with the others about the war.

Franklin D. Roosevelt being presented a globe by the United States Army at the White House in Washington, D.C. Photo, December 1942. Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library.
Franklin D. Roosevelt being presented a globe by the United States Army at the White House in Washington, D.C. Photo, December 1942. Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library.

The history of the globes was authoritatively documented by the American geographer and cartographer Arthur H. Robinson, who was the director of the map division of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II. Robinson later taught geography at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1947 until 1980 and was highly influential in his field. He is well-known for creating the Robinson projection, a map projection for displaying the world that was adopted by Rand McNally and the National Geographic Society, among other organizations.

Robinson’s OSS team was responsible for the production and procurement of cartographic materials that were beyond the scope of other governmental and military sources. The President’s Globe was one such specially tailored OSS product. Robinson said the globes offered the leaders “a view rather like that of an astronaut today. That certainly would have helped them contemplate the immense strategic and logistical problems of a truly global conflict.”

The OSS mapmakers who worked on the project, however, never received personal credit. Instead, they left a “signature” by inserting their hometowns onto the sphere. One can only guess which towns or cities those might be among the 17,000 place names present.

Detail of military globe showing hometowns. United States Office of Strategic Services and Weber Costello Co., c1942. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress.
Detail of [military globe] by United States Office of Strategic Services and Weber Costello Co., c1942. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress.
The physical production of the globes was outsourced to Weber Costello Co., a company based in Chicago Heights, Illinois. The globes were constructed from two interlocking wooden sections. The company pasted the OSS-created globe gores on the massive sphere. The gores were 3-feet long and 4.5 inches at their widest point. Pasting them onto the globe was a great feat of craftsmanship. A copy of the gores is held by the Geography and Map Division, as seen below. The weight and size of the globe required that a special base be manufactured to hold and rotate it. The cradle employs rubber balls seated in steel cups to rotate the huge sphere.

50 inch military globe gores that are placed on the President's Globe
[50ʺ military globe gores] by United States Office of Strategic Services, c1942. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress.
The three duplicate globes owned by Roosevelt, Churchill, and Marshall were not the extent of the production run. Robinson placed the total number of globes between 12 and 15 but stated that the known records of Weber Costello Co. records are seemingly incomplete, which precludes a more definitive statement on the count. Roosevelt’s own globe is now part of the former president’s library and museum in New York.

Nonetheless, one globe that previously resided in the House of Representatives is on display in the Geography and Map Division Reading Room of the Library of Congress. Today, visitors to the division are welcome to see the globe, just one of our amazing cartographic artifacts.

Comments (6)

  1. VERY cool!! Thanks for sharing!

    Larry

  2. I was looking for locations where I could see this globe in person and ran across this blog entry. My parents worked in the Cartography office in OSS where this globe was made. They did not work on it directly but my mother did do lots of research later on regarding those who did. She did that research for Arthur “Robbie” Robinson, who recruited both my parents to come to DC to help stand up that cartography group. My mother is still living, she is 98, and I would love to bring her to see the globe. Is it on display in the Madison Building? If so, do you know if it is possible to arrange for parking somewhere on the campus. She is in a wheelchair and it would be challenging to get her there.

    • Hello Susan,

      Regarding the questions you asked on the blog’s comment section, the globe is on display in the Madison Building, Geography and Map Division.

      Location:
      101 Independence Ave. SE
      Madison Bldg, Room LM B01
      Washington, D.C. 20540-4650
      Phone: 202-707-6277 (MAPS)

      Hours:
      Weekdays, 8:30am to 5:00pm
      Closed Weekends
      & Federal Holidays

      Unfortunately, the library does not offer parking to the public, please see the link below and note number 14.

      https://www.loc.gov/accessibility/frequently-asked-questions/

      Sincerely,

      Ryan Moore
      Library of Congress

  3. I enjoy knowing from this work. Congratulation to the author. Thank you.

  4. Thank you so much for the address to it’s location! It would be a bewilderment to view this behemoth of a ball! With the explorations of Rear Admiral Richard E. Byrd this would be miraculously believable!! Over 500 pounds!

  5. FYI, I spotted Churchill’s globe the other day — parked in a corner of his artistic studio at his country home, Chartwell. It’s so big that his snug underground war room in London doesn’t have space for it now.

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