Saltburn-by-the-Sea: The Early Years of a Stockton and Darlington Railway Company Venture

Abstract

There are throughout Great Britain numerous examples of nineteenth century new towns built on green field sites and in the north of England, for example, the names of Middlesbrough, West Hartlepool, Millom, Barrow and Silloth spring to mind. Saltburn-by-the-Sea on what was the coast of the North Riding of Yorkshire is of special interest in that, although a seaside resort, it was projected and built by the personalities who earlier had built the Stockton and Darlington Railway. This article attempts to describe the first twenty years of the existence of this new town, giving details of its physical development and indicating the struggle of the founders to make it a viable commercial enterprise.     

Draft town maps for John speed's theatre of the empire of great Britaine

ABSTRACT

A unique Hebrew map of the Exodus and the Holy Land was printed in Mantua, Italy, in the mid-sixteenth century. This map is graphically and artistically different from all other Hebrew maps, both earlier and later. The aim here is to analyze the map and the text that is printed on it, explore the reasons for, and the context of, its printing, and identify its sources within contemporary Jewish scholarship and Christian cartography. The only known exemplar of this map is in the Zentralbibliothek in Zürich, Switzerland.     

Academic Cartography,Internal Map History,and the Critical Study of Mapping Processes

ABSTRACT

Academic cartographers consistently expressed an interest in the history of map form (design and practice), at least until the 1980s. This essay reviews the formation of academic cartography, primarily in central Europe and the United States, and the scholarly work on the internal history of cartography that was clearly manifested in Imago Mundi. Internal map history catalysed the development of socio-cultural map histories after 1980 but did not itself change along those new lines. This was unfortunate because it is by paying attention to internal questions of the physical and graphic form of maps and the practices of mapping—albeit critically reconfigured as the processes of producing, circulating and consuming maps—that map historians will discover new and fertile intellectual ground.     

Frank Clifford Rose Memorial Lecture: The tale of three trephines: Surgeons and their surgical-instrument makers in Britain,France, and America in the nineteenth century

ABSTRACT

Trephines and trepanning date to ancient times, but a “modern” form of instruments was codified by the seventeenth century. This did not preclude efforts to “improve” the trephine in the late-eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Surgeons and instrument makers in Britain (Jardine and Savigny), France (Thomson and Charrière), and America (Galt and Otto & Reynders) endeavored to make the trephine safer and more precise. In exploring their interactions, this presentation shows the evolving role of the instrument makers not only as fabricators of tools, but as creative design collaborators of surgeons and physicians.     

Regionalism and Nationalism in the Railway Cartography of Mid-Nineteenth Century Germany

This article concerns German railway cartography in the mid-nineteenth century and its effects on spatio-political perceptions. The evolution of a railway system in Germany, from isolated single routes into national and ultimately international networks, has been customarily linked to the political issue of unification in 1871. The infrastructural changes triggered the introduction of new maps and map signs, which overshadowed other national and political signs and should not be seen as a simple means to a nationalist end. By examining the developing iconography of railways and railway networks, I argue that railways were a cause of deterritorialization for regions and states and for the vision of a unified Germany.     

Tracks Across the Irwell: From the Liverpool & Manchester Railway to the Ordsall Chord

ABSTRACT

Archaeological excavations and built heritage recording has been undertaken by Salford Archaeology (based within the Centre for Applied Archaeology, University of Salford) during the construction of a new rail link across the River Irwell between Manchester and Salford, known as the ‘Ordsall Chord’. The new bridge links existing lines of historic importance, and also crosses the extant remains of the world’s first passenger steam railway, the Liverpool & Manchester Railway, being carried over the Grade I designated ‘Stephenson's Bridge’ at approximately deck level. Six further Grade II designated structures were also affected by the scheme, as were the below-ground remains of a dye works that predated the opening of the railway in the 1830s, and a large livestock market that grew adjacent to the improved transport infrastructure provided by the rail network. This paper discusses the archaeological work undertaken on this important early transport hub during the construction programme in 2015–18.     

On Trial—Social Relations of Map Production in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Britain

ABSTRACT

This article examines the social relations of map production in mid-nineteenth-century Britain with reference to moments when maps and their makers were ‘on trial’—legally in court in Edinburgh in 1853 and by public opinion in London in 1854 following a lecture. The principal protagonists include Alexander Keith Johnston of the map firm W. & A. K. Johnston, the German cartographer August Petermann, the mapseller Trelawney Saunders and John Bartholomew junior of the Bartholomew map firm. The article draws upon Thomas Gieryn’s idea of the ‘truth spot’ and on Matthew Edney’s call for studies in processual map history.     

Chronicle for 1993

Abstract

Theory is not a goal in itself but a means of enriching the history of cartography by stimulating new research questions and objectives. In this paper the concept of ‘transparent maps’ (carriers of an image of the external reality of the world) and ‘opaque maps’ is introduced. The notion is approached structurally (standards of graphical representation, drawing, geometry, text); through the sociology of the map (map makers, institutions, the public); and through seeing maps in their cultural and historical context (an approach which raises issues of the definitional boundaries of the history of cartography and which is arguably one of the most stimulating perspectives today as fostered by, in particular, contributors to the History of Cartography). Finally, attention is drawn to three important topics for the research agenda: the links between maps and culture; maps as a language of communication and as instruments of power; and the links between perception, logic and mnemonics.     

Archaeological Investigations of York South Motive Power Depot

ABSTRACT

Results of a study of the southern portion of the railway lands adjacent to York Station are considered. An early straight shed and a rare combination of three roundhouses, variously built by the Great North of England Railway, the York and North Midland Railway and the North Eastern Railway at the York South Motive Power Depot, were investigated and preserved in situ beneath the new rail operating centre, the largest in the country. Originally constructed between 1841 and 1864, these remarkable engine sheds remained in railway use for up to 120 years. Documentary and archaeological evidence is considered and placed within a wider context to explain how these buildings were adapted as their functions evolved. This allows us to understand how the sheds remained in operation after comparable structures at other depots became obsolete.     

The Secrets of a long life: The Dutch firm of covens & mortier (1685–1866) and their copper plates

Abstract

Commercial map publishing firms between the mid‐sixteenth and mid‐nineteenth centuries needed to prolong the life of their copper plates for as long as possible. In order to avoid the costs of engraving new plates, the famous Dutch publishing house of Covens & Mortier of Amsterdam (1685–1866) amended existing plates for topographical and politico‐administrative changes, engraving errors, imprint alterations and marks resulting from general wear. Not only were the plates altered, but the printed maps themselves were sometimes also modified: a new title cartouche might be pasted on or a date or part of the text scratched away. In these ways the map publishing firm was a master of creative solutions as regards both the re‐use of old copper plates and the ‘renewal’ of old printed maps.     

British Diplomacy,Propaganda, and War Strategy and the Hungarian-Romanian Dispute over Transylvania in 1939–40

Abstract

Between 1914 and 1935, the cities of Vienna and Pressburg/Bratislava were linked by an electric railway known as the Pressburgerbahn. More than just a line of transportation, the railway became intertwined with the complex politics of identity in Pressburg. The Pressburgerbahn presented nationalists in the Habsburg Empire with a dilemma: it had the potential to contribute to the unification of the nation, but at the same time was transnational by definition. This paradox generated a heated controversy about the Pressburgerbahn between Magyar nationalists and the predominantly German-speaking Pressburg bourgeoisie. Using biologized rhetoric, Hungarian politicians and journalists portrayed their nation as a body politic that was disfigured by having a railway ‘vein’ cross the border into Austria, in particular from such a peripheral location as Pressburg. By contrast, the discourse of the German-speaking bourgeoisie was firmly anchored in an imperial, supra-ethnic landscape. This controversy was replayed following the incorporation of the renamed city of Bratislava into Czechoslovakia in 1919: the Prague-based Ministry of Railways employed the rhetoric of the railway as an integrating structure within the body politic, while the eventual closure of the Pressburgerbahn in 1935 was closely connected to the belated nationalization of Bratislava. The railway to Vienna thus became a symbol of the liminal status of the town as a whole, in terms of nation, geography, politics and culture.     

British School Atlases, 1880–1930: Questions of Relevance,Credibility and Authorship in the Production of Geographical Knowledge

Abstract

The focus in this article is on school atlases produced in Britain in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries and on what is revealed, both in their pages and in the processes behind their compilation, about the people who were producing and using such map books. The Bartholomew Archive, in Edinburgh, has proved to be an exceptionally rich source of hitherto unexamined data on the business and personal activities of one of the leading producers of school atlases, the local firm of John Bartholomew and Son, which was active in map making and publishing between 1880 and 1987. The sociology and pattern of communication of publishing, explored by book historians and historians of science, geography and cartography in other contexts, are here considered in relation to the atlases that were produced in Britain for schools in the United Kingdom and in other parts of the Empire in the period 1880–1930. Particular attention is paid to the efforts of mapmakers, publishers, geographers and other professionals to ensure the relevance of the maps selected in school atlases for specific audiences, to guarantee the credibility of the information communicated through these atlases, and to negotiate questions of authorship.     

Illustrating the Phaenomena: Celestial Cartography in Antiquity and the Middle Ages

Abstract

The Ordnance Survey's Boundary Survey, carried out between 1841 and 1888, was a major undertaking which resulted in the local administrative boundaries of the whole of Great Britain being reliably mapped for the first time. This was not achieved by imposition but by the use of local knowledge of boundaries, thus making permanent a communal memory of administrative geography and rendering it globally accessible through maps. The Boundary Survey aided the reform of local government areas, a process which started during the same period and provided derived data for the burgeoning collection of statistics in the nineteenth century.     

A View from America: Map Collecting, ‘Treasure-House’ Libraries,and American Civic Influences on the History of Cartography

Abstract

The study of the history of cartography in the United States has been profoundly shaped by the peculiar American institution sometimes known as the ‘treasure house’. These libraries, located in major metropolitan areas and at prestigious universities, were created through the philanthropy of businessmen of local and national significance, most of whom also collected maps and books. The collecting patterns of these philanthropists and the institutions they helped to found emphasized materials (including maps) relating to American history and culture before 1800. This emphasis on pre-nineteenth century holdings tended to marginalize the historical study of most post-1800 cartography in the United States until the middle of the twentieth century. At the same time, as a case study of Chicago’s Newberry Library shows, the development of these collections was flavoured by the civic and regional pride of their host communities and the aspirations to be regional, national and global metropolises.     

Railway Architecture: The Great Northern Railway (Ireland) at Dundalk

ABSTRACT

This article is adapted from the dissertation ‘Railway Architecture: The Great Northern Railway (Ireland) at Dundalk’, completed by Siobhan Osgood for the MPhil in Art History: Art + Ireland, where it was awarded a distinction. The study provides an historical analysis in the context of architectural development and broader railway culture in Ireland to provide an interpretation and understanding of the use of polychromatic yellow, red and black brickwork to create a visual identity for railway architecture. The use of accented colours to pick out key features is repeated across a series of buildings, thus creating a distinctive style of ‘brick-branding’. These are most prominent in the town of Dundalk, where the GNRI had its central engineering works at the halfway point on the Dublin to Belfast mainline and at the point where the Irish North line extended west and north. The buildings were each intricately designed by the GNRI's first chief engineer, William Hemingway Mills, a second-generation railway engineer who merged the roles of architect and engineer using an amalgamation of architectural designs from his earlier career in Derby, Scotland, Mexico and Spain. Mills thus created his own ‘Millsian’ style of industrial architectural design.     

Theory and the history of cartography

Abstract

Cartographic history has been dominated by an empiricism that treats the nature of maps as self‐evident and which denies the presence of any theory. In contrast, this paper argues that theories lie at the root of all empirical study whether or not they are acknowledged. The linear, progressive model of cartographic development, for example, is not a law deduced from historical evidence; if it were it would be easily and quickly dismissed. It derives instead from our cultural beliefs concerning the nature of maps, which is to say from our unexamined theories. Historians of cartography need to be critical of their assumptions and preconceptions. Theoretical discussions in the history of cartography must address not whether we should use theory at all but to which theories we should adhere. It is inadequate simply to knock theories down. We must establish a debate in which old understandings of maps, of their creation, and of their use are replaced by better (that is, more consistent and coherent) theories.     

Political chess and vernacular discursive strategies: A study of the late Qing Sichuan Railway Protection Movement

ABSTRACT

Interdisciplinary literary and historical studies of late Qing vernacular are rare, and the vernacular texts of the Sichuan Railway Protection Movement have been overlooked by academics. This paper focuses on this topic, arguing that the discursive strategies in such texts revolved around the movement's aim of “breaking the agreement and protecting the railway,” and primarily included discourses on constitutionalism, financial interests, patriotism, cultural order, and the late emperor, as well the ideas of “ridding the emperor of evil ministers,” borrowed from traditional Chinese political discourses, and “national subjugation,” within the context of the national crisis. None of these discourses were “anti-Manchu” or “revolutionary,” yet they were able to mobilize the people of Sichuan to devote themselves to the Railway Protection Movement, as well as attracting the “sympathetic understanding” of high-ranking Sichuan officials, such as Wang Renwen 王人文 and Zhao Erfeng 赵尔丰, thus lending discursive power to the railway protection camp in its game of political chess with the Qing court. Meanwhile, the government's weak discursive power was an important factor in the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty by the revolutionary tide triggered by the Sichuan Railway Protection Movement. The discursive strategies in vernacular texts on railway protection (including the particularly strategic discourse on the late emperor) spread, transformed, and were reborn to varying degrees over the course of history.