-------- Original Message -------- Subject: What pocket map of California did John Muir use? Date: Wed, 7 Nov 2007 22:38:53 -0500 From: Mary Douglass <[log in to unmask]> To: [log in to unmask] CC: Mary Douglass <[log in to unmask]> Today I was contacted by an author who discovered my name/number as the current president of WAML (Western Association of Map Libraries). He has a map question which he has not been able to answer, and he asked if I could query the "map experts". Rather than trying to paraphrase his question, I will insert his whole request. You can certainly reply directly to him ([log in to unmask]), or I can relay the information to him if you reply to the list. "Donna and I are writing a history/guide book for Wilderness Press about our 2006 project/walk to recreate John Muir's 1868 walk from San Francisco to Yosemite. You can see information about our project on our web site: www.johnmuir.org/walk. What I would like to ask your membership is if anyone can help give any insight to our question. John Muir said he bought a pocket map of California in New York in March of 1868. Which map would that most likely have been. Knowing this will help us determine what level of detail John Muir had about the route. We have already looked at many maps using the resources at the California State Library and referring to Carl Wheat's Mapping the Trans-Mississippi West. What we cannot determine from our research so far is would one of the maps been more commonly refereed to as a pocket? Here is the information we have gathered: Muir writes: The day before the sailing of the Panama ship [March 13, 1868] I bought a pocket map of California and allowed myself to be persuaded to buy a dozen large maps, mounted on rollers, with a map of the world on one side and the United States on the other. [Footnote 2] In vain I said I had no use for them. "But surely you want to make money in California, don't you? Everything out there is very dear. We'll sell you a dozen of these fine maps for two dollars each and you can easily sell them in California for ten dollars apiece." I foolishly allowed myself to be persuaded. The maps made a very large, awkward bundle, but fortunately it was the only baggage I had except my little plant press and a small India rubber bag. Footnote 2 [I may be missing information here and will appreciate any help or corrections] When Muir said he carried a "pocket map", he meant a small folding map in contrast a big cloth-mounted wall map. Which map did he have? There were two maps of California available at that time. One was "Bancroft's Map of California, Nevada, Utah and Arizona" published in San Francisco, the other "A new map of the States of California and Nevada" by Leander Ransom and A. J. Doolittle, published by W. Holt in San Francisco. These maps both show similar details, cities, mountain ranges and rivers, but neither map has much information when compared with modern street and topographic maps. [There were several editions of both maps, but details do not change much between the 1867 and 1868 editions of the Bancroft map. is this correct, I have only seen one edition of the Ransom map?] Both maps only show a single road from Oakland through San Jose to Gilroy, and then what must be the Butterfield Stage Road going over the Pacheco Pass, then south towards Fresno. There is no route from Pacheco Pass to Yosemite. There were also more detailed California maps available, but only for specific regions of the state. Of these there are two that would have been of value to Muir. One is the topographical and railroad map of the Central part of California published in 1865 C. Bielawski, the other Bancroft's Map of Seventy Miles around San Francisco from 1866. The Bielawski map has better detail, showing the two roads down the east bay and details of the road to Gilroy. The maps southern limit is Pacheco Peak, so it does not show a road over the pass. If you know what you are looking at, you find see the confluence of the Merced and San Joaquin Rivers at the border of the map and determine there is a road going east from Hills Ferry. But it is unlikely that Muir saw this map, as he recounts he had to ask which way to go upon reaching Gilroy."