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Subject: The first-ever computer generated atlas?
Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2004 21:56:50 +0100
From: Bartlett, Darius <[log in to unmask]>


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Dear friends,

Please can anyone help settle a (friendly) argument I am having with a
colleague? We are trying to identify what was the world's first-ever
published atlas, where the maps were created entirely by means of
computerised methods?

I remember being told, many, many years ago, that "Agriculture in Ireland :
a census atlas" by A.A. Horner, J.A. Walsh and J.A. Williams
(Univesity College Dublin, Department of Geography, 1984), ISBN/ISSN
0901120812, was a prime candidate for the title. My colleague thinks there
were almost certainly earlier ones, but which and where?

Note we are talking here about ENTIRELY computer-generated mapping. So, by
this definition, Perring and Waters' "Atlas of the British Flora" would not
count, innovative and notable as it was, because this used computers to
overprint crosses (X) corresponding to the thematic data (grid points where
relevant vegetation occurred) on top of outline maps of Britain and Ireland
that had been created and printed by  more traditional means.

I look forward to your suggestions and ideas!

Best regards

Darius Bartlett