During the second half of the nineteenth century, the introduction of the post office changed daily life in the Western United States. Over the course of 50 years, the number of post offices in this region expanded from just a handful to several hundred. Some post offices were established and stayed in operation long term; others had much shorter life spans as the west continued to change.
Ah yes, taxes are due today! And here are a few interesting sites you might want to visit.
Why are taxes due today, April 18th?
Basically because the 15th fell on a Saturday and Monday was Emancipation Day in Washington DC. Read more about it here.
Tax Freedom Day
Tax Freedom Day is a significant date for taxpayers because it represents how long Americans as a whole have to work in order to pay the nation’s tax burden. Basically you are working for the government! Continue reading
Are you into creating your own projections? Try out Flex Projector. Flex Projector is a freeware application that allows you to easily modify dozens of world map projections. It is intended as a tool for practicing mapmakers and students of cartography. Check it out!
Besides being our first president of the United States, George Washington was also a chart maker, cartographer, and land surveyor. Check out this article about him and the map depicting his Mount Vernon estate.
Thanks goes to LA County GIS for finding this one. Here are the top 14 maps and charts that explain Valentine’s Day.
Hillmap is a web based mapping app that lets you create and print free, customizable maps from high quality map layers. You can also use Hillmap tools to calculate slope and distance, check the weather at your destination, analyze snowpack, and more.
This app is definitely handy to calculate your hiking route and check on the slope. You can also turn on multiple overlays, like slope, weather radar, and other map information. Give it a spin!
Check out this interesting article about books with maps that you might have read when you were young. The maps were used to describe the fictional world you were reading about.
Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, many believed California was a remote island with plenty of gold, free-loving amazons, and strange beasts.
A new exhibit at Cal State Fullerton’s Pollak Library features a selection of maps from the Roy V. Boswell Collection for the History of Cartography, one of the University’s special collections. The exhibit, “California As an Island and Worlds That Never Were,” will be on display Jan. 22 to March 29 in the Salz-Pollak Atrium Gallery.
Looking to go on a road trip? If you know your stops, why not let Python figure out the most optimum route for you? Click below to learn how it is done.
52 19th and early 20th century maps of California have been added to the California Historical Society’s new Digital Library. The images represent a sampling of unique or uncommonly held titles ranging geographically from an 1863 map of the copper region of Del Norte County in the north, to a circa 1866 Topographical Map Showing the Locations of the Sutro Tunnel and the Comstock Lode, to a colorful 1913 townsite map of Date City (now called Calipatria) in Imperial County in the south. In between are city, county, mining, real property, water-supply, road, and railroad maps of various localities throughout the state. Check it out!
SoCalGIS.org 