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This map wonderfully illustrates a point in time when the states made from the Northwest Territory were only partly formed and partially surveyed and subdivided. One can see how the most detailed survey work commenced along the Ohio, Mississippi and Detroit Rivers and spread up and out to the hinterlands.

Here we see Michigan beginning to take a more modern shape. As the...

In 1865, Michigan’s mineral resources were just beginning to make a mark on the world. The western movement of people and wartime reliance on northern transportation routes drew attention to Michigan’s newly convenient resources including iron ore, copper, and salt.

The map at first glance is typical of its day, highlighting land divisions and railroad routes. But drawn over it in light lines are the boundaries of major geologic features of Michigan, which had recently been...

This map shows us that our fascination with depictions of California as an island is nothing new. This 1772 map compares five maps of California that had been drawn between 1604 through 1767. During this time span California went from being a peninsula to an island, and back to a peninsula again.

The Spanish were the primary European explorers in the area. Traveling up the west coast of America from the south, the Baja...

This map depicts the status of land division and disposition of Datoka Territory, under the United States General Land Office. At this time Dakota Territory comprised modern day North Dakota and South Dakota.

In the prior decade gold had been discovered inside the Great Sioux Reservation, which had led to the war between the United States and the Native Americans living in the region. This map shows the Great Sioux Reservation with its revised boundary...