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1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
 Gorgeous. Sep 17, 2007
David Rumsey, Cartographica Extraordinaire: The Historical Map Transformed (ESRI, 2004)
This massive coffee table book is all about maps (mostly of the United States, with a few from other parts of North America thrown in for good measure) and how they change over time, not only as people discover more about the world they live in, but as progress takes its toll, measuring tools improve, etc. Simply put, it's fascinating. Rumsey's stated goal, both with this book and with his website, is to bring historical maps back into prominence as tools to understand history and change, and this is certainly a fine start. The writing (there isn't much, but what there is is always on point) is engaging, the maps are fascinating, and the book itself is quite nicely put together; given its size, I'd have expected some binding defects or the like. A wonderful piece of work, worth every penny. I wish it had gone into a little greater detail in some of the framing text, but that's hardly something to quibble over in a project of this magnitude. ****
 map lovers, look out! Mar 17, 2006
this is truly an extraordinary book, with excellent reproductions of all types of maps. the index provides the original map dimensions, which i found helpful. this book would be a great additional to any library, young or old.
25 of 26 found the following review helpful:
History Through Illuminating Maps Sep 15, 2004
David Rumsey was fascinated by maps as a kid, and they were always papered onto the walls of his room. The fascination with maps did not leave him, through several degrees in fine art and a career in real estate. He amassed one of the largest private collections of maps, The David Rumsey Historical Map Collection, 150,000 catalogued items stored on the ground floor of his house in San Francisco, which is a working library for people to use. The items are wall maps, folding maps, globes, map puzzles, and many others. There is a sampling of the collection in _Cartographica Extraordinaire: The Historical Map Transformed_ (ESRI Press) by David Rumsey and Edith M. Punt, a slim but large-paged, handsome volume containing all kinds of maps concentrating on North America. They show the history of America, to be sure, but are also a history of mapmaking. Rumsey has painstakingly put items in his collection on the Internet, so he himself is participating in mapmaking history, and some pages of this beautiful book demonstrate what can be done with maps transformed into pixels.
Looking at these lovely maps is to participate a bit in Rumsey's enthusiasm, which one can pick up from his introduction: "A map, especially a historical map, ... communicates both above and below the narrow bands of language and observation." There are only a hundred and twenty or so maps selected here, but besides being beautiful objects to contemplate, they show an amazingly diverse range of ideas: how people explored coasts, or how train schedules were arranged before we had standard time zones, or how we claimed, organized, and sold the land. For those of us who only look at highway maps, there is an enormous education here. It is barely possible to mention the subjects of some of these maps; if this subject matter at all interests you, nothing will do except to get the book itself and look through the pages. For instance, the map by William Clark (of Lewis and Clark) of the trek across western America is here, but in a version issued by Rumsey in celebration of the 200th anniversary of their travels. It shows the original drawing, seamlessly enclosed within the General Land Survey's first map of the area, which is itself within a 1971 map of a US Geographic Survey National Atlas, which in turn is within a Landsat mosaic from NASA. The joins of the maps are seamless because they all were turned into computer data that could be massaged in just the right way, and because they are "georectified" to match up perfectly. This was hardest to do with Clark's 1814 map, which because of survey and navigation limitations of his time (not because of sloppy mapmaking) had accurate latitudes and distorted longitudes.
Rumsey's collection exists physically, of course, but access to the historical maps entailed the basic problem of "many hands taking hold of rare and delicate objects." Digital photography and computer storage have opened his collection for anyone who wants to look, and you don't even have to be there physically. He has found that magnified images of the maps can show details that were obscure even in the originals. Astonishingly, information compression has meant that a picture that originally required 400 megabytes can actually be stored in 3% of that size without loss of image quality. By digitizing his maps and making them available, Rumsey has himself stepped into cartographic history. This book is a demonstration in book form of what Geographic Information Systems can do, and Rumsey sees the "digital wizardry of GIS not as a break from the past and old mapping traditions," but part of those traditions. If you go to the website, you can look around anywhere; there is no guide. _Cartographica Extraordinaire_, on the other hand, has the job of demonstrating the progress of history and of information display, and does both engagingly and handsomely.
11 of 11 found the following review helpful:
An outstanding and representative collection Jul 09, 2004
The impressively collaborative work of David Rumsey (President of Cartography Associates, a San Francisco-based digital publishing company, and Director of Luna Imaging, a provider of enterprise software for online image collections) and Edith M. Punt (professional cartographer and recipient of the 1996 National Geographic Award in Cartography), Cartographica Extraordinaire: The Historical Map Transformed is a 160-page, hardcover, coffee-table book printed on archival paper which showcases how technology has literally transformed the restoration, re-creation and reproduction of historical maps. The specific focus is upon maps (and the people who made them) that reflect American history and ranges from a 1736 atlas depicting California as an island, to a Civil War era "bird's-eye" view of military positions on the southeastern seaboard. This is an outstanding and representative collection drawn from the David Rumsey Map Collection and illustrates early American history from a uniquely geographic perspective. With it's informed and informative text, Cartographica Extraordinaire is clearly recommended for inclusion into professional, academic and community library Cartography Studies or American History collections. Indeed, Cartographica Extraordinaire would make an excellent selection for a truly unique Library Memorial Fund acquisition.
8 of 9 found the following review helpful:
Not just extraordinary, it's amazing Jul 04, 2004
At first sight, this is a gorgeous book. It exhibits historical maps made in nineteenth century America, and the reader might expect a reverential approach of the map collector that David Rumsey exemplifies. But David Rumsey is also the person who provides amazing open access to his collection through the highest tech web site. He sees maps not just as curiosities, but as a way to get inside the past. With Edith Punt, they have tied the maps into the social, environmental and technological changes that are shown. They use the most current geographic information systems technology to spark a connection to the current landscape. The old fragile maps come alive. While this book has the format and polish of your average coffee table book, this is a book to read and reread.
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