The Library of Congress

Map Collections: 1500-2004

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Go directly to the collection, Map Collections: 1500-2004, in American Memory, or view a Summary of Resources related to the collection.

Map Collections: 1500-2004 brings Americana and cartographic treasures of the Library of Congress online, covering approximately four hundred years of map making. Students can study maps from seven theme categories to learn about the changing face of America and the evolution of map-making techniques throughout history: Cities and Towns, Conservation and Environment, Discovery and Exploration, Cultural Landscape, Military Battles and Campaigns, Transportation and Communication, and General Maps. Within these categories there are links to other collections: Panoramic Maps, 1847-1929, Mapping the National Parks, Maps of Liberia, and Railroad Maps.

1) Cities and Towns

L'Enfant's 1791 Manuscript Plan of the city of Washington. 1791

This category includes maps that cover everything from individual buildings to panoramic views of large urban areas. These maps record the development of American cities and include individual maps as well as a collection of Panoramic Maps, 1847-1929. Search on L'Enfant or use the Cities and Towns Maps Title List to locate L'Enfant's 1791 Manuscript Plan of the city of Washington.

Students can study the development of the nation's capital using Pierre Charles L'Enfant's historic 1791 plan for Washington, D.C. Using the National Park Service site on the National Mall, students can compare today's mall with L'Enfant's original plan.

2) Conservation and Environment

A map of Yellowstone National Park, 1871 (detail)

These historic and recent maps document changes in recreational and wilderness areas as well as the growth and development of U.S. National Parks.

The Yellowstone Maps Collection shows how individual explorers and map makers influenced the national parks. For example, between 1870 and 1878, Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden conducted a United States Geological Survey of Yellowstone. With him were William Henry Jackson as official photographer and Thomas Moran as accompanying artist. Their work from the expedition was publicized in the East and helped spur designation of Yellowstone as the first national park in 1872.

Search on Hayden to find maps of the Yellowstone region made under his direction.

3) Discovery and Exploration

A map of Lewis and Clark's track . . ., 1814

This category documents the European discovery and exploration of the Americas. Many of the maps reflect the Age of Discoveries (fifteenth to seventeenth centuries) when Europeans focused on drawing outlines of the continents they explored and on mapping coastal areas and major waterways. This category also includes eighteenth and nineteenth century maps that document exploration of the interior of continents and the work of government explorers and surveyors.

Search on Clark or use the Discovery and Exploration Maps Title List to find the map shown above documenting Lewis and Clark's track. This map can serve as a springboard for research about the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Using the bibliographic record, students can find information about when the expedition occurred, what the expedition route was, who made the map, and when the map was created.

4) Cultural Landscape

This section includes census maps and land-ownership records that reveal the ethnic origins of settlement areas as well as maps that record the establishment of farmsteads and villages. This category also contains the "American Colonization Society Collection of Maps of Liberia".

A plan of my farm on Little Huntg. Creek & Potomk. R. G. W., 1766 (detail)

Search on George Washington or review the Cultural Landscape Maps Title List to find this map of George Washington's property adjacent to his Mt. Vernon residence.

Students can use this map to launch research on the nation's first president. Students might locate the Potomac river (spelled Potomack on this map). Students might then use the bibliographic record of the map to discover that Washington himself was the map maker and to determine Washington's age when he made the map.

 

5) Military Battles and Campaigns

Boston, its environs and harbour, 1775 (detail)

This category includes maps of major military conflicts. The maps show troop movements, defensive structures and groundworks, roads to and from battle sites, campsites, local surroundings, and information about Native American settlements. Some maps were drawn on the battlefield, while others were engraved after conflicts ended. Notes on the maps often tell the history of battles or campaigns.

Students can use this category to study maps of the Revolutionary War. From the Military Battles and Campaigns Maps Title List, select maps with dates ranging from 1776 through 1783 (when the Treaty of Paris officially ended the Revolutionary War). For example, students might discover a 1775 map of Boston and its environs.

6) Transportation and Communication

The maps in this category document the development of national, state, and local transportation and communication systems. Transportation maps show canal and river systems, cycling routes, railways, roads, and traffic patterns. Communication maps illustrate telegraph routes, telephone systems, and radio coverage. This category contains individual maps and the Railroad Maps Collection.

Telegraph Stations in the United States, the Canadas & Nova Scotia, 1853 (detail)

Search on telegraph or review the Transportation/Communication Maps Title List to find Telegraph Stations in the United States.

This map, made just nine years after the first successful telegraph message was sent, can help students study the growth of telecommunications in the United States. Students might examine the map to locate states with the greatest number of telegraph stations and then answer questions such as:

• Why do these states have more telegraph stations than others?
• Why is only the east coast shown?

Students might compare the rate chart at the left of the map to current long distance telephone and Internet access charges.

7) General Maps

General maps portray geographic areas larger than cities or towns. A wide variety of historic and current regional, state, country, and world maps is included. These maps show change within a region throughout time as well as the development of the map-making process.

Students can look carefully at historical atlases in the collection and compare them with an atlas of today. Search on atlas or explore the Special Presentation on "Atlases" to find maps drawn and hand colored in the sixteenth century. Students might then discuss questions such as:

• Are there recognizable countries in these atlases? How do they differ from those in the current atlas?
• Are there any countries missing?
• What features are in the historical atlases that you do not see in the current images?