The Library of Congress

Mapping the National Parks

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Go directly to the collection, Mapping the National Parks, in American Memory, or view a Summary of Resources related to the collection.

Through the study of Mapping the National Parks students can build historical-thinking skills. They can compare maps of the same area to look for change over time, or they can do an in-depth study of the relationship between land-ownership and the creation of the United States. The collection's maps can also be used to learn sophisticated analysis and interpretation skills and to grapple with the issue of property rights. Finally, the collection can instigate research into national parks and related uses of land.

Chronological Thinking

Explorers, cartographers, government officials and others have gathered data about the land that became national parks from the time before it was designated as park land to the present day. By comparing maps of the same land area made at various dates, students can investigate how the land changed as well as how the information gathered about this land changed over time. For example, search on Maine to retrieve the maps of this state and of the Acadia National Park. Students can view the maps in chronological order, looking for the similarities and differences among the maps.

From their observations, students can also determine what technological advances may have assisted the data collectors. For example, look at different ways cartographers represented topography. In early maps, cartographers represented mountains with circles of small lines. Later, a system was standardized using topographic lines to indicate more exact elevation.

Chart of the coast of Maine, 1837.

Topographic Map, Acadia National Park, 1942.

Also available in Mapping the National Parks are chronologically arranged collections of topographic quadrangle maps of Tennessee and North Carolina at a scale of 1:24,000. Students can look at these highly detailed maps of small regions of the parks and look for change over time. Note that items drawn in purple represent new developments from previous versions of the same map. To see how these quadrangles fit together, view the Topographic Quadrangle Map section of the special presentation Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Scale 1:24,000 (1941) - Dellwood.	Scale 1:24,000 (1941/rev. 1967) - Dellwood.	Scale 1:24,000 (1979) - Dellwood.
Bibliographic Information

Historical Comprehension

Through this collection, students may gain an understanding of the evolution of land ownership in North America and its relation to the development of a nation of united states. To begin, they can browse the Title Index or Geographic Location Index to get a sense of the land itself. Images of the land can enhance one's use of these maps, and may be found by searching on the names of places depicted in the maps, in American Memory's photographic and print collections. Next, they can browse the Special Presentations and search the maps on Indian for information about the first inhabitants of the land. This too can be enhanced with searches on Indian in American Memory.

Next, students can browse the Title Index and Special Presentations and search the collection on exploration and route for information about the stages of exploration that changed the ownership and use of the land for over three centuries. Searching explorer in Pioneering the Upper Midwest locates journals and narratives by explorers that bring another dimension to their study. Students can better understanding the related topic of colonization by using the 1755 map used by the negotiators at the treaty of Paris. With this map, they can also learn about the role of war in changing the ownership of land and therefore a nation's boundaries. Searching on Mexican war in American Memory, students may learn about that conflict and its impact on the development of the United States.

A map of the Tennessee government, formerly part of North Carolina.

By searching on territory and state, students can find evidence of the manner in which the United States grew. Searching on slave and secession, in Civil War Maps, students can get a feel for the importance of states and territories to the Civil War conflict, and the precarious state of the nation before the war, reflected in changing map boundaries and designations of loyalties.

While the United States has for all intents and purposes ceased to grow, the use of its land continues to change. What other changes of land use and ownership are evidenced in the collection's maps? What do these changes suggest about the people who inhabit the land, their government, society, and values?

Historical Analysis and Interpretation

Cartographers created the national park maps for a variety of purposes and goals. Some maps had one specific goal, while many had multiple intended functions. The cartographers' goals reflect what was going on in that period of American history. Therefore, in addition to information about the land it depicts, a map also provides information about the creator's goals and the historical background that informed the map's creation. Teachers may use this collection to help students to access this level of meaning in their analysis and interpretation of maps, which can also be applied to other historical artifacts, including literature. Students can choose an era in American history and browse the collection by Geographic Location to find maps that existed at that time. They can use the questions below to determine the cartographers' goals and the events of that period:

Grand Canyon of the Colorado, 1904.

• Who made the map? Was this person a government employee? Hired by a private company? Self-employed? What assumptions can we make about the map from this knowledge?
• What is the most prominent feature of the map? For example, is it transportation routes? Boundaries and land ownership? Topography?
• Why would a map with these details be needed at the time it was made? Was the country at war? What form of transportation was most commonly used? Was the park easily accessible to the average citizen?
• How might the cartographer have been trying to influence people's perception of the land? Why might he have tried to affect their perception in this way? Was he effective?

Historical Issue-Analysis and Decision-Making

Mapping the National Parks provides students an opportunity to study the issue of landownership and property rights. By reading the special presentations about the four parks featured in this collection, Acadia, Grand Canyon, Great Smoky Mountains, and Yellowstone, students will learn who owned and controlled these lands prior to their becoming national parks. Trace the land's history from Native Americans to European settlers to Americans to the federal government. Explore the following questions in a class discussion:

• What does it mean to own the land? How might different cultures understand landownership?
• How do people and nations assert their claim to land?
• What are the different ways landownership transfers from one person to another?

America noviter delineata, 1640?.

Continue the discussion by asking students to consider how they would react to the federal government designating land they owned to be a national park. Would they object? Would they demand certain compensation? Introduce the concept of eminent domain, defined by Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary as: a right of a government to take private property for public use by virtue of the superior dominion of the sovereign power over all lands within its jurisdiction.

The U.S. Government uses the right of eminent domain for power lines, damns and other public utilities. Search on the phrase eminent domain in THOMAS, legislative information online, to find current examples of the government's use of this right.

Historical Research Capabilities

America has national parks, national monuments, national forests, and state, county, and local-level versions of these entities. Maps from this collection instigate research into the definitions and regulations governing these entities. What are the similarities and differences in how they are maintained? Funded? Regulated? How does their designation determine how the land is used by different "stake holders" such as the government, miners, loggers, hunters, and vacationers? How do the different entities reflect different uses and different significance for Americans?

Students can research and discuss what factors contribute to a land being designated a national park as opposed to a national monument or forest. They can use the parks featured in this collection as a starting point. Begin by reading the special presentations about the four parks featured in the collection: Acadia, Grand Canyon, Great Smoky Mountains, and Yellowstone. Continue the research by searching the collection by park name to find maps that feature the characteristics that led to the parks becoming national parks, as opposed to other uses.

Die amerikanische Staats-DomŠne (National Park) im Quellgebiete des Yellowstone Flusses mit den Geyser-Gebieten, 1871.