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wyman10.bsky.social
UofA Map/GIS Librarian
@wyman10.bsky.social
1.5K followers 440 following 250 posts
William C. Wonders Map Collection, University of Alberta Library. Curation by Wyman Laliberté (he/him) (settler on Treaty 6 land).
WCW Map Collection on Internet Archive
https://archive.org/details/wcw
#spatial #maps #cartography #gis #qgis
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wyman10.bsky.social
Deep into woodlands winds a mazy way, reaching to overlapping spurs of mountains bathed in their hill-side blue. But though the map lies tranced, pine-tree shakes down its sighs upon this cartographer's head, yet all were vain, unless the cartographer's eye were fixed upon the stream before them.
[map portion] Showing Woodland Density. From: Brewer, William H. (1884). Woodland US. United States. Census Office.
December 1, 2025 at 3:47 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
As every one knows, maps and cartography are wedded for ever. But here is a Cartographer, desiring to map the dreamiest, shadiest, quietest, most enchanting bit of romantic landscape in all the valley of the Saco. There stand trees, here sleeps meadow, up from yonder cottage goes a sleepy smoke.
[map portion] Showing Saco river. From: Carey, Mathew. (1811). New Hampshire. M. Carey
December 1, 2025 at 3:47 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
Take any path that carries you down in a dale and leaves you there by a pool in the stream. Let the most absentminded of maps be plunged in deepest reveries, stand that map on it's legs, set it's feet going Should you ever be athirst, your caravan happen to be supplied with a metaphysical cartouche.
[map portion] Showing Metaphysical Cartouche. From: Willdey, George. (1714). Map projected upon the plane of the horizon. George Willdey
December 1, 2025 at 3:47 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
Look! Here come more maps. Noting will content them but the extremest limit of the land; loitering under the shady lee of yonder will not suffice. And there they stand—leagues coming from north, east, south, and west. Does the magnetic virtue of the needles of the compasses attract them thither?
[map portion] Showing a compass rose. From: The Atlantic Ocean. Laurie & Whittle.
December 1, 2025 at 3:47 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
Circumambulate the city. What do you see?—Posted like silent sentinels stand thousands of maps. Leaning against the spiles; seated upon the pier-heads; looking over the bulwarks of ships. These are all maps. Tied to counters, nailed to benches, clinched to desks. How then is this? What do they here?
[map portion] Showing Corlears Hook. From Tanner, Henry S. (1836). New York. H.S. Tanner [map portion] Showing Coenties Slip. From: Bourquin, Frederick. (1848). City Of New York. S. Augustus Mitchell.
December 1, 2025 at 3:47 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
Your insular city of the Manhattoes, belted round by wharves as Indian isles by coral reefs—commerce surrounds it with it's surf. The streets take you waterward. Downtown is the battery, where that noble map is washed by waves, and cooled by breezes. Look at the crowds of map-gazers there.
[portion] Mitchell, Samuel Augustus. (1846). City of New-York. S.A. Mitchell Melville, Herman. (1930). Moby Dick or The Whale. Illustrated by Rockwell Kent. The Modern Library.
December 1, 2025 at 3:47 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
This mapping is the substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish I quietly take to map making. There is nothing surprising in this. If they but knew it, almost all in their degree, some time or other, cherish very nearly the same feelings towards the ocean of cartography.
[Illustration portion[. From: Homann, Johann Baptist. (1716). View: Balaenarum Walfische.
December 1, 2025 at 3:47 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
When I find myself growing grim about the mouth; when I find myself pausing before coffin warehouses, and especially when my hypos get an upper hand, that it requires a moral principle to prevent me from stepping into the street, and knocking hats off. Then. I account it high time to get mapping.
[map portion] Shows Knocking. From: Geological Survey of Great Britain and Ireland. (1883). Great Britain, Ordnance Survey Office.
December 1, 2025 at 3:47 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
Call me Oblique. Having little or no planimetric in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me, I thought I would map the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation. Moby-Dick; or, The [Map] #hermapville
[modified] Rockwell Kent illustration (Loomings, 1) [map portion] Geological Survey. (1890). Nantucket sheet. Topographical Survey Commission. Melville, Herman. (1930). Moby Dick or The Whale. Illustrated by Rockwell Kent. The Modern Library.
December 1, 2025 at 3:47 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
Is there a better collection of Cherubs rocking beyond the neatline? #CherubRock
Taddeo Crivelli / Claudius #Ptolemy (printed c. 1590)
tinyurl.com/3w6bbsnw
Taddeo Crivelli / Claudius Ptolemy (printed c. 1590) Taddeo Crivelli / Claudius Ptolemy (printed c. 1590)
December 1, 2025 at 12:03 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
EXTRACTS (by a map-map-librarian)
Painstaking burrower and grub-worm of a poor devil. The map librarian appears to have gone through the long street stalls of the earth, picking up whatever random allusions to maps they could find in any book, sacred or profane. Moby-Dick; or, The [MAP] #hermapville
[modified] Rockwell Kent illustration (Inscribed to Nathaniel Hawthorne) [portion] Bartlett, J. R. (1884). Pilot chart of the North Atlantic Ocean. December 1884. United States. Naval Oceanographic Office. Melville, Herman. (1930). Moby Dick or The Whale. Illustrated by Rockwell Kent. The Modern Library.
November 30, 2025 at 3:30 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
ETYMOLOGY.
The pale map—threadbare. The cartographer, ever dusting old lexicons, with a handkerchief, embellished with all the flags of all the known nations of the world. Map makers loved to dust old grammars; it somehow mildly reminded them of their mortality. Moby-Dick; or, THE [MAP] #hermapville
[modified] Rockwell Kent illustration (ETYMOLOGY, xiii) [portion] Hagelgans, Johann Georg. (1718). Atlas Historicus. Melville, Herman. (1930). Moby Dick or The Whale. Illustrated by Rockwell Kent. The Modern Library.
November 30, 2025 at 1:51 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
Image from Henry Everett's 1956 map "The Voyage of the Pequod from the Book Moby Dick by Herman Melville."
tinyurl.com/mvefb4ws

Ismael, buoyed by a coffin-canoe, "floating on a soft and dirgelike [map]." (Epilogue - Moby Dick or The Whale)

The #map, floating, soft, and #dirgelike...
[map portion] is from Henry Everett's 1956 map "The Voyage of the Pequod from the Book Moby Dick by Herman Melville.
November 21, 2025 at 1:58 PM
wyman10.bsky.social
reproductions/facsimiles are important artifacts for prairie fringe map collections a mini display for some guests last week #WCWMC
Browse the Theatrum orbis terrarum--corpus of old atlases in facsimile by Theatrum Orbis Terrarum Ltd.
archive.org/details/WCWd...
including a "performative" cover
A display of various William C. Wonders Map Collection atlas and map reproductions. cover of Theatrum orbis terrarum--corpus of old atlases in facsimile by Theatrum Orbis Terrarum Ltd.
November 21, 2025 at 1:30 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
#Terracotta #TrueScale #GISDay and the Visionaries #maquette dropped in for an orientation session.
www.ualberta.ca/en/museums/m...
#RiverLot5 #Treaty6
The Visionaries (maquette) Artist Barbara Paterson While the statue presents a conversation between the two university founders about the location of the proposed university, there is a deeper, layered history that the statue overlooks. The map held by Rutherford depicts a section of land marked with the number 5, which would become the future home of the University of Alberta. This map illustrates the presence of Métis river lots and specifically marks River Lot 5, along the south bank of the North Saskatchewan River. River Lot 5 was also a place where the Laurent Garneau family lived, played and made a living. River lots were included in the 1882 Dominion of Canada Survey for the settlement of Edmonton, Northwest Territories. The statue, however, provides limited visual information on who was present on the land and suggests that it was uninhabited before the university’s establishment. The history of these lands, prior to European contact in western Canada, included Niitsitapi (Blackfoot), Dene, Néhiyaw (Cree) and Stoney Nakoda Nations. There would have been agreements or treaties in place between these Nations around sharing of the land. In essence, the statue simplifies the layered history of the land and points to the erasure of First Nations presence, of Treaty Six (signed in 1876) history, and the disenfranchisement of the Papaschase Cree Nation and their reserve (No. 136) lands. Large statues such as “The Visionaries” serve to publicly affirm the history and authority of those who are portrayed in the work. Although intended to celebrate the institutional founding of the University of Alberta, the statue brings to light the importance of acknowledging Indigenous Peoples and lands, and the way complex and layered histories are remembered and commemorated on campus. This is the endeavour of the people who continue to work and study at the University of Alberta today. University of Alberta Art Collection University of Alberta Museums https://www.ualberta.ca/en/museums/museum-collections/art-collection/the-visionaries.html
November 20, 2025 at 1:41 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
#30DayMapChallenge Day 19 #Projections
#Hyperboloid projection
milage network scale 1:25,000-1:35,000
Falk-Verlag. (1961) Hamburg.
archive.org/details/hamb...
This map in a Beatle back pocket unfolding in the toppermost of the poppermost days playing clubs along Grosse Freiheit street in Hamburg
Map showing Hamburg in 1961. Published by Falk-Verlag. The map makes use of the Hyperboloid projection allowing for the more condensed areas to be at larger scale 1:25,000 and the scale 1:35,000 becomes smaller in the more sparse areas. [portion] of a map showing Hamburg in 1961. Published by FalkVerlag. This section and along Grosse Freiheit street was where the Beatles played between 1960-62. One can image this map folded, unfolded, refolded in a Beatle Back pocket.
November 19, 2025 at 3:00 PM
wyman10.bsky.social
#30DayMapChallenge Day 13 10 min. Map
Pre 1900 Trail Network
Along the North Saskatchewan River
With a wisp of a north arrow from
Plan d’ une Partie de la Riviere Rouge - North Sheet (1871)
www.flickr.com/photos/manit...
November 13, 2025 at 4:29 PM
wyman10.bsky.social
A request for historical maps of the Edmonton River Valley turned up this 1978 Capital City Recreation Park brochure (tabloid size!) archive.org/details/WCWd...
Lots of interesting planning and river valley history (Water Quality, Bank Stabilization, and the infamous Strathcona Science Park, ect.)
Cover of the 1978 Capital City Recreation Park [publicity brochure] Notes: It was to provide improved recreational opportunities for all Edmontonians, as well as to upgrade river facilities before the 1978 Commonwealth Games, that the Alberta government decided to provide about $34 million for a parks development in the river valley of east Edmonton. Most of the planning and development for this river area, now known as the Capital City Recreation Park, is complete. It complements the city’s 1970 master plan for parks development and provides funds for trails, landscaping, shoreline stabilization, public use amenities, a science centre, four pedestrian bridges, fresh water lagoons, and property acquisition within two narrow strips on both banks of the North Saskatchewan River. The vision, to provide a recreation playground in the river heart of a rapidly growing and modern city, is not a new one. As early as 1907, the city council of that era entertained a report by Frederick G. Todd, a landscape architect from Montreal, that designed a plan for parks and boulevards in Edmonton. It recommended ... “every advantage should be taken of the great natural beauty of the situation . . . by withdrawing for parks purposes, property, such as the river valley and ravines.” Mr. Todd’s recommendation for a river valley park system was accepted and adopted into the 1915 city plan. In 1933, the city zoned much of the area for use as a “public park”, introducing land use regulations to that effect. A further report, the Bland-Spence Sales Report, was adopted in principle by city council in 1949. It recommended a “comprehensive system of parkways’’ throughout the whole river valley and proposed a system by which development in the river valley could be opposed. This was first implemented in 1951 when council approved a plan showing Rossdale Flats as proposed parkland. [map] Overall Plan, Trails and Improvements in the 1978 Capital City Recreation Park Shows: RESTRICTED DEVELOPMENT AREA WATER CONSERVATION AREA BIKEPATH HIKING TRAIL FOOTBRIDGE UNDERPASS TOEBERM AMENITIES STRUCTURES AND PARK BUILDINGS PARKING LOTS From the 1978 Capital City Recreation Park [publicity brochure] Capital City Recreational Park Opening Day Activities, July 9, 1978. From the 1978 Capital City Recreation Park [publicity brochure] Strathcona Science Park forms the most easterly node of the Capital City Recreation Park plan, and will provide a dynamic new provincial educational and cultural facility in a beautifully landscaped provincial park. Strathcona Science Park is located on the eastern side of the North Saskatchewan River in the County of Strathcona, adjacent to the eastern gateway to the city. at Highway No. 16. The Strathcona site is about 2 kilometres in length and up to 1,500 metres in width. It comprises a high plateau with steep slopes dropping down to the river, affording commanding views of the river valley, downtown Edmonton and petrochemical industries nearby. The 350-acre site is a key element in the Capital City Recreation Park plan, providing for rehabilitation and beautification of a derelict site ringed by industry, which otherwise might adversely affect the Capital City Park concept. The planning of the park has been the responsibility of the Science Centre Committee, with Raymond Harrison, MRAIC, as the programming and development consultant. The concept of a river valley park fringing an industrial area is not only noteworthy in itself, but it provides a relevant setting for a natural resource science interpretive centre. As the first major cultural facility on the eastern side of Edmonton, it provides a balance to the museums and the historical and cultural attractions located in the western part. When fully developed, the south end of Strathcona Science Park will feature a nature interpretive area in the ravine and an extensive picnic area with well developed viewpoints. The Strathcona Science Park is being developed as a vital public educational institution in popular science and technology, for the purpose of enabling Albertans to better understand the rapid and complex changes taking place now and in the future.
November 12, 2025 at 11:43 PM
wyman10.bsky.social
... remaining cabinet clusters still holding their soldered edges in the #archaeosphere
November 12, 2025 at 4:34 PM
wyman10.bsky.social
#30DayMapChallenge Day 12 #Map2125

After the "the burning of the transom lockers" or the purge of archives 2038-40. Only wrack lined linen backed spatial fragments survived. Along with some...
[section] Plan showing the region explored by S. J. Dawson and his party between Fort William, Lake Superior and the Great Saskatchewan River from 1st of August 1857, to 1st November 1858. [linen backed) Printed in Toronto by John Lovell. To accompany Report on the Exploration of the country between Lake Superior and the Red River Settlement and between the latter place and the Assiniboine and Saskatchewan, by S. J. Dawson. https://archive.org/details/reportonexplorat00unse/page/24/mode/2up
November 12, 2025 at 4:34 PM
wyman10.bsky.social
The maps overflow area or The Elevator Room (ER) needs to be cleared (like the Canadian Circumpolar Collection) to make room for a renovation on the fourth floor. To accommodate ever changing office space requirements.
1st image ER on November 5th, 2025
2nd image ER on November 10th, 2025
The William C. Wonders Map Collection "over-flow", area. Essentially unprocessed donations. It is on the 4th floor of Cameron Library (University of Alberta). It use to be the Gov. Docs. service (reference desk) area. Picture taken November 5th, 2025. The William C. Wonders Map Collection "over-flow", area. Essentially unprocessed donations. It is on the 4th floor of the Cameron Library. Post wall map removal November 10th, 2025.
November 12, 2025 at 4:00 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
Wall maps move again.
10 years ago they went from the old offsite storage "The BARD" (2nd pic) back to the library in the overflow storage area or The Elevator Room.

The richest appreciation one can have of a [wall map] is to know what prompted that conscious decision to put it there. (Ed Dahl)
William C. Wonders Map Collection, collection of Wall Maps. Moving from the overflow map storage area, fourth floor elevator room Cameron Library, to the Map Room. In 2016 we weeded the wall maps that were stored in the UAL's off site storage called "The BARD". All weeded wall maps (maps already in the collection as flat maps in cabinet drawers) went to Edmonton's Reuse Centre where by all accounts they were gone within hours after drop-off. This is essentially 1/3 of the original wall map corpus. Wall maps were the power-point of their day and valuable items for in-class teaching. Now they cover walls, or are used as curtains, and once and a while borrowed. This may look like a shamble of cloth backed spatial analogues but they go for a hefty price online. This is an image from 2016 These are the wall maps that were essentially returned to the community via Edmonton's Reuse Centre. These are wall maps that duplicated flat maps already stored in the William C. Wonders Map Collection map cabinets. It is interesting to think they are all now scattered across Edmonton doing what they do best - hanging around and filtering light.
November 12, 2025 at 4:00 AM
wyman10.bsky.social
#30DayMapChallenge Day 11 #MinimalMap
2 #Maps + 1 #LightTable
General map Routes in British North America explored by Captain Palliser 1967-60 #Mylar
Economic Geology [1:250000]. 1894 Geological Atlas of the US Livingston Folio, Montana #Paper
Hamilton Light Table #Light
#30DayMapChallenge Day 11 #MinimalMap 2 #Maps + 1 #LightTable General map of the routes in British North America explored by the expedition under Captain Palliser during the years 1857, 1858, 1859, 1860 - compiled from the Observations and Reports of Captain Palliser and his Officers, including the Maps constructed by Dr. Hector, and other authentic documents #Mylar https://archive.org/details/WCW_M000367/ Economic Geology [1:250000]. 1894 Geological Atlas of the US Livingston Folio, Montana #Paper Hamilton Light Table #Light [Cover] Department of the Interior United States Geological Survey J.W. Powell, Director Geologic Atlas of the United States Livingston Folio, Montana Scale: 40 Miles -1 Inch List of Sheets: Description, Topography, Areal Geology, Economic Geology, Structure Sections, Columnar Sections Field Edition Washington, D.C. Engraved and Printed by the U.S. Geological Survey Bailey Willis, Editor of Geologic Maps S.J. Kübel, Chief Engraver 1894 [map] Economic Geology Montana, Livingston Sheet Scale [1:250000] Contour Interval 200 feet Edition of July 1893 Surveyed in 1886-87 [section of map] General map of the routes in British North America explored by the expedition under Captain Palliser during the years 1857, 1858, 1859, 1860 - compiled from the Observations and Reports of Captain Palliser and his Officers, including the Maps constructed by Dr. Hector, and other authentic documents. By John Palliser, British North American Exploring Expedition https://archive.org/details/WCW_M000367/
November 11, 2025 at 4:48 PM
wyman10.bsky.social
#30DayMapChallenge Day 10 #AirTraffic
Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) 1956
10 maps showing #SAS air traffic routes.
Great #PubNotes Just scroll down past the AI summaries (which should be treated as provisional and verified against primary sources) tinyurl.com/2ppcfbuu #DavidRumseyMapCollection
Sheet 1. SAS The Global Airline. Created by Jorleif Uthaug in 1956. Oslo, Norway. #PubNote Large wall map in nine sheets which, when joined, measure 278cm x 381cm. Shows the worldwide routes of the Scandinavian Airlines System. Shows celestial constellations and scenes of people around the globe. Similar in scope and style to the large Boucher world maps for Air France (see our 10284.000 and 10163.000) and the TWA world map (see our 10164.000). The map's maker, artist Jørleif Uthaug, sculptor, painter, and graphic artist, (1911-90) was a spearhead and trail blazer in modernistic abstract art in Norway. He created works of art for cruise liners, hotels, schools, municipality buildings, in materials as varied as stone, wood and glass mosaics, steel, brass, iron and canvases of various sizes. See http://www.uthaug.n… for more information on him. The map uses a special map projection by Dr. A. Refsdal, although we could find no information on it. Composite Sheets 1-9. SAS The Global Airline. Created by Jorleif Uthaug in 1956. Oslo, Norway.
November 10, 2025 at 5:12 PM
wyman10.bsky.social
Day 5 #30DayMapChallenge - #Earth
The U.S. Ex. Ex.) of 1838–1842
Fig. 1. USS Peacock in Contact with the Ice.
www.davidrumsey.com/luna/servlet...
Chart of the Antarctic Continent. 1840
www.davidrumsey.com/luna/servlet...
#WhiteWall #WhiteWhale
Fig. 1. USS Peacock in Contact with the Ice. Alfred Thomas Agate. NUSEE Vol. 2. Facing page 318. Public Domain. [image] Peacock in contact with ice-berg. A.T. Agate pt. M. Osborne sc. (Philadelphia: Lea & Blanchard. 1845). According (Grunes 2021) it is through expedition leader Charles Wilkes, Melville explores the nonhuman sublime, its power to test human physical and epistemological limits, and the driving ambition it provokes. In the process, Melville extends Wilkes’s image of the “icy barrier” around Antarctica. This wall, barrier, or mask becomes an origin point for the ambitions—Ahabian, Ishmaelian, Wilkesian and even Melvillian—that energize epic endeavors, including those of the young republic’s nascent expansionist imperialism. Grunes, M. (2021). Ahab and Ishmael in Antarctica: How Charles Wilkes’s White Continent Gave Rise to the White Whale. Leviathan (Hempstead, N.Y.), 23(2), 3–33. https://doi.org/10.1353/lvn.2021.0013 [portion] of Chart of the Antarctic Continent. 1840. Showing "Line of Icy Barrier" "To Americans, Antarctic exploration offered possibilities for economic expansion as well as the less tangible prize of international glory. This fascination culminated in the discovery of the Antarctic continent in 1840 by the United States Exploring Expedition (or U.S. Ex. Ex.), commanded by the relentlessly ambitious Navy Lieutenant Charles Wilkes. When Wilkes led his ships south, it was unknown whether ice, land, or open ocean covered the South Pole. Within only a few weeks, the expedition had identified the existence of the continent; yet Wilkes had an even grander goal in mind: to land on the continent. For nearly two bitter months, his men mapped 1,500 miles of the coastline, seeking an opening in the icy barrier girding the continent. They never set foot on it." From - Grunes, M. (2021). Ahab and Ishmael in Antarctica: How Charles Wilkes’s White Continent Gave Rise to the White Whale. Leviathan (Hempstead, N.Y.), 23(2), 3–33. https://doi.org/10.1353/lvn.2021.0013 Grunes, M. (2021). Ahab and Ishmael in Antarctica: How Charles Wilkes’s White Continent Gave Rise to the White Whale. Leviathan (Hempstead, N.Y.), 23(2), 3–33. https://doi.org/10.1353/lvn.2021.0013
November 5, 2025 at 10:23 PM