Wednesday, October 21, 2020

Mapping the View from Mount Washington

In 1902 the Boston and Maine Railroad published an interesting map which shows the view from Mount Washington in New Hampshire. 

The Birds-eye view from summit of Mt. Washington; White Mountains, New Hampshire numbers all the mountains surrounding Mount Washington and identifies each of them in corresponding lists in each of the map's four corners. What is most interesting about the map is its 360-degree panoramic perspective. The mountain summit and the railroad station are positioned at the center of the map. The surrounding topography is then distorted and wrapped around this central view. 

If you held the map in your hands at the top of Mount Washington and rotated the map to reflect your direction of view you could then easily identify each of the mountains in your current vista. Unfortunately it isn't always so easy to rotate your computer's monitor. Which can make the map a little difficult to read online. 

Luckily however John Nelson and Jinnan Zhang have created a Rotating Bird's Eye View From Mount Washington map. Open up this interactive version of the Boston and Maine Railroad's map and you can rotate the map using your mouse's scroll-wheel. As you scroll the map rotates around its center so now you don't have to keep turning your monitor upside down. 

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I own this map