Illinois Maps

I just received my author copies of Illinois: Mapping the Prairie State Through History! The book looks great. I wrote all of the text in the book, including the map captions and excluding Vincent Virga's Foreword (in which he was kind enough to mention me by name). This book is one in a series being published for each state by Globe Pequot Press, and Vincent Virga is the "point man" on all of the books. As I understand it, he is responsible for researching and selecting the Library of Congress maps to be included in each book.

From the front cover flyleaf:

"Mapping States through History is the first series to assemble -- in full color, state by state -- an in-depth collection of rare, historically significant maps of the cities, states, counties, towns, and events that make up each of America's fifty states."

Map collectors and history buffs are the primary audience for this book. I imagine that college libraries in the appropriate states will want to have copies.


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My book Illinois: Mapping the Prairie State Through History is scheduled for publication by Globe Pequot Press in November 2010.

The book is part of a series that Globe is doing for each state using maps from the Library of Congress, many of which have never been published before.

These books, produced from the archives of the Library of Congress and edited by Vincent Virga, offer a glimpse into the history of the United States through rare historical full-color maps, narrative captions, and short essays.

Combining 50 rare, beautiful, and diverse maps of the Prairie State from the collections of the Library of Congress, a foreword by Vincent Virga about the Library of Congress collection and the Illinois maps, informative captions about the origins and contents of those maps, and essays on state history, this book is a collectible for cartography buffs and a celebration of Illinois for residents, former residents, and visitors.

My job was to write chapters covering the history of Illinois as well as captions for the maps.

I recommend these books to anyone who has an interest in maps or state history -- or even American History and geography in general for that matter.

The book is available for pre-order through Amazon, Borders.com, etc.