Top of page
Posted by: Julie Stoner
In the previous post of this blog series, Extremities of the Earth, we explored the depths of the lowest natural point on earth. We will now travel in the opposite direction, to the heights of Mount Everest, the highest point on earth from sea level at 29,029 feet (8,848 m) above sea level. The peak …
Posted in: Exploration, Physical Geography, Series: Extremities of the Earth
Posted by: Julie Stoner
I love watching the Olympic Games, both summer and winter! So with the Winter Olympics starting this week in P’yongch’ang, I decided to dive into our collections to learn more about historic maps of Korea, encompassing what is now North and South Korea. As I began browsing our digitized collections, I was first struck by …
Posted in: Asian History, Manuscripts
Posted by: Julie Stoner
It was once thought that the ocean floor was a vast, flat, featureless plain. In the 1840s, explorers began to measure the depth of the ocean and came to the realization that there was as much variety in the contours of the ocean floor as there was on dry land. It is at the bottom …
Posted in: Exploration, Physical Geography, Series: Extremities of the Earth
Posted by: Julie Stoner
Every month on our home page, we provide a monthly list of maps that have been scanned and added to the online collections of the Geography and Map Division. To celebrate the end of the year and to ring in the new, I took a look back at the lists of maps that have been …
Posted in: Exploring the Early Americas, Geography and Map Division, Series: A Year in Review
Posted by: Julie Stoner
Where is the lowest point on dry land? Or the northernmost inhabited point on earth? How about the highest city? All of these questions and many more will be unraveled in this new occasional series, Extremities of the Earth, created to explore the farthest reaches of our planet. For this inaugural post for the series, …
Posted in: Exploration, Series: Extremities of the Earth
Posted by: Julie Stoner
The following post is by Mike Buscher, head of the Reference Team in the Geography and Map Division. This baseball postseason has been a particularly exciting time for baseball fans. The first five games of the 2017 World Series have truly been an “October Classic,” featuring two teams that have not appeared in a World …
Posted in: Guest Posts
Posted by: Julie Stoner
I have always been interested in the colonial era of American history. I was excited to come across a unique form of cartographic artifact during this time: the powder horn map. Powder horns were made from cow or ox horn and used for carrying gunpowder. Embellishing these animal horns with maps was a popular activity …
Posted in: 18th century cartography, American History
Posted by: Julie Stoner
If you have read other Library of Congress blogs, in particular the Prints and Photographs Division’s Picture This, you may recognize my name. I am now working in the Geography and Map Division and will be an active member of the Worlds Revealed blog team. I am excited for the opportunity to share my findings …
Posted in: Exploration