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Posted by: Meagan Snow
Let’s journey back a hundred years in time to the downtown streets of Seattle, Washington. On a clear day, you can see the Olympic Mountains from the fish markets along Railroad Avenue. Eddie Carlson, who will one day bring the 1962 World’s Fair – and the Space Needle – to Seattle, is now just a …
Posted in: 20th century cartography
Posted by: Amelia Raines
Growing up in Michigan, I was a lake enthusiast from a young age, and extremely proud that my home state was surrounded by North America’s most important inland bodies of water. These are, of course, the Great Lakes, so called because of their size – according to the 2020 National Geographic Atlas of the World, …
Posted in: 19th century cartography, 20th century cartography, African History, American History, Physical Geography
Posted by: Carissa Pastuch
Jean-François de Galaup La Pérouse (1741–88) was a French naval officer and explorer, known for his discoveries in the Pacific, particularly off the northern coasts of America and Asia, and for his tragic demise near Vanikoro in the Santa Cruz Islands (present-day Solomon Islands) in 1788. Born in Albi, France, La Pérouse joined the French …
Posted in: 18th century cartography, Exploration, Oceania
Posted by: Cynthia Smith
The Geography and Map Division holds thousands of vintage and antique nautical charts. Among the most compelling navigational charts in our holdings are the traditional stick charts of the Marshall Islands. The first time that I saw them, displayed in shadow boxes, I thought they looked like striking works of modern art. My curiosity led …
Posted in: Asian History, Exploration, Oceania
Posted by: Amelia Raines
In 1887, a French lieutenant named Edmond Caron sailed a gunboat down the Niger River to gather information and expand French influence in the western Sahel. After setting out from the colonial capital in Saint-Louis, on the Atlantic coast of Senegal, he traveled inland to the Inner Niger Delta of modern central Mali, an area …
Posted in: 19th century cartography, African History
Posted by: John Hessler
This post is part of the series Excavating Archaeology, which features selections from, and research on, the Jay I. Kislak Collection of the Archaeology & History of the Early Americas and related collections, housed in the Geography and Map Division and in the Rare Book & Special Collections Division of the Library of Congress. Dr. …
Posted in: Exploring the Early Americas, Kislak Collection, Series: Excavating Archaeology
Posted by: Sonia Kahn
Many of us have heard the tale of Mrs. O’Leary’s infamous cow as the driver of one of Chicago’s greatest disasters. Whether or not the beast did in fact start the blaze may never be known, but the fact remains that the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 decimated the city over a three day period …
Posted in: 19th century cartography, American History, City Histories
Posted by: Cynthia Smith
During the early 20th century, the British explorers Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton, and the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen, led expeditions to the South Pole. Roald Amundsen’s polar party was the first to reach the South Pole on December 14th, 1911; five weeks later the polar party led by Robert Falcon Scott was the …
Posted in: 20th century cartography, Exploration
Posted by: John Hessler
This post is part of the series Excavating Archaeology, which features selections from, and research on, the Jay I. Kislak Collection of the Archaeology & History of the Early Americas and related collections, housed in the Geography and Map Division and in the Rare Book & Special Collections Division of the Library of Congress. He …
Posted in: Exploring the Early Americas, Kislak Collection, Series: Excavating Archaeology