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Posted by: Julie Stoner
This is a guest post by Robert Morris, Acquisitions Specialist in the Geography and Map Division. The Geography and Map Division’s (G&M) collection of panoramic maps portray U.S. and Canadian cities and towns as if viewed from a few thousand feet above at an oblique angle. Bird’s-eye views, perspective maps, and aerial views are other …
Posted in: 19th century cartography, 20th century cartography, Guest Posts
Posted by: Julie Stoner
Celebrated as a state holiday in Utah, Pioneer Day commemorates the first members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints entering the Salt Lake Valley on July 24, 1847. Since the foundation of the Church in 1830, Latter-day Saints were faced with persecution and driven out of every community they started in New …
Posted in: 19th century cartography, City Histories
Posted by: Cynthia Smith
This post focuses on three decorative 19th century fans from the collections of the Geography and Map Division. The art of Asian fan making dates to ancient times. According to Gonglin Qian, author of Chinese Fans: Artistry and Aesthetics the earliest Chinese fan that has been found dates from 475 to 221 BC. It was …
Posted in: 19th century cartography, Asian History
Posted by: Julie Stoner
One of my favorite computer games as a child was called The Yukon Trail. Made in 1994, the player became a prospector in the late 19th century Klondike gold rush, navigating the treacherous trail in an attempt to stay alive and strike it rich. What I recently discovered while browsing our map collections is that games related …
Posted in: 19th century cartography, American History
Posted by: Ed Redmond
Originally published in 1874, these maps of the eastern half of the United States were designed to show the distribution of diseases including typhoid, malaria, pneumonia, tuberculosis, and rheumatism that affected the US population. The maps were published by L.H. Carney, M.D., but we find no biographical data on the author. Medical data (in the …
Posted in: 19th century cartography
Posted by: Ed Redmond
As we learned in my previous blog, surveying is the art of measuring land. During the 18th century colonial surveying was relatively crude. A fixed “beginning point” such as a tree or a rock was established as the starting point for the survey. A 66 foot long chain, commonly known as a Gunters Chain, was …
Posted in: 18th century cartography, 19th century cartography
![Plan goroda Dalʹni︠a︡go / glavnyĭ inzhener V. Sakharov. [Russia]: Litografiia T. Daloniago, [around 1899]. Map, lithographic print. Scale approximately 1:21,000. 0.01 [represents] 100 sagenes. Geography and Map Division. LC call number G7824.D3 1899 .S3](https://blogs.loc.gov/maps/files/2019/10/Untitled-1.jpg)
Posted by: Mike Klein
In 1898 Tsarist Russia wrested from China a long-term lease for Port Arthur (Lushun), its new-found warm-water port on the east coast restricted to use by the Russian navy. Under pressure from Great Britain and Germany, two other European powers with concessions in China, Russia agreed to establish an open port on the southern tip …
Posted in: 19th century cartography
Posted by: Julie Stoner
Board games have been played around the world for millennia. One of the oldest board games known to exist, named Senet, appears in an Egyptian hieroglyph from about 5,000 years ago! The late 18th century saw a rise in the creation of board games in Europe, many of which were educational, designed to be an …
Posted in: 19th century cartography
Posted by: Cynthia Smith
Above is an image of the constellation Perseus holding the head of Medusa, famous for her serpentine hair. This chart is from a Russian celestial atlas published in 1829. I became aware of this unusual atlas while searching for new acquisitions for the collections of Geography and Map Division. This led me to learn more …
Posted in: 19th century cartography