2001 Nebenzahl Lectures Held in Conjunction with International Map Collectors' Society Annual Symposium

For historians of cartography the term “commercial cartography” often “has a faintly pejorative air, tending to denote maps of a lesser quality, whether aesthetic or geographic.” So observes Dr. Mary Pedley (William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan), the featured speaker at the Fourteenth Kenneth Nebenzahl, Jr., Lectures in the History of Cartography, which were held at the Newberry on October 11-13, 2001. After hearing the three virtuoso lectures she delivered over the first two days of the event, few of the two hundred people in attendance would dispute that Dr. Pedley had put this perception to rest. In the early modern world, and perhaps no less today, commercial cartographers were not bottom feeders at the margins of a mainstream of or more scientific or refined cartography. Rather, the commercial motive was central to the mapping enterprise, whether conducted at the behest of governments, scientific organizations, or other interests. “All printed maps are in some way commercial,” Pedley noted, “whether they were created for sale or not. Every aspect of map production from survey and compilation to printing and distribution involved specialized labor and materials to which a value was attached…. Simply put: behind every printed map was someone waiting to be paid.” The theme of the 2001 Nebenzahl Lectures, in which Dr. Pedley’s lectures played the leading role, was A Taste for Maps: Commerce and Cartography in Early Modern Europe. Pedley’s three lectures, along with three shorter papers presented during a concluding session, examined the history of the map trade in Europe with a keen eye to the business aspects of cartography, from production to consumption.

The Nebenzahl Lectures were especially festive on this occasion, because the audience included 120 members of the International Map Collectors’ Society, here for their Twentieth International Symposium, which included the Nebenzahl Lectures and additional sessions and events lasting through October 16. The event began on Thursday evening, October 11, with the first of three lectures concerned with the map trade in eighteenth-century England and France. “Getting to Market: From Map to Print in London and Paris,” examined the economic aspects of surveying, compiling, editing, and printing maps in eighteenth century England and France. On Friday Pedley presented two additional lectures. “Giving Pleasure to the Public: Adding up to Cost,” presented in the morning, was concerned with the considerations that went into the marketing of maps, including pricing strategies and the protection of what we would today call “intellectual property.” “Good Map/Bad Map: Telling the Difference,” Pedley’s final lecture, was presented on Friday afternoon. Here she considered the criteria by which maps were judged and the strategies cartographers and map publishers devised to improve the quality of their maps. Afterwards, all in attendance gathered for a reception sponsored by the University of Chicago Press, publisher of the books that have emerged from the Nebenzahl Lecture series.

On Saturday morning, a panel of three distinguished international scholars presented shorter papers on the business of mapmaking in other parts of Europe, intended to stimulate a broader discussion of the history of maps as commercial products. First, Dr. David Woodward (University of Wisconsin-Madison) offered a provocative paper focussing on the later sixteenth and early seventeenth century Italian map publishers. Dr. Peter van der Krogt (Universiteit Utrecht) then offered a revealing examination of commercial rivalry in the seventeen-century Netherlands entitled “Hondius-Janssonius vs. Blaeu: Competition in Amsterdam.” Dr. Markus Heinz (Staatsbibliothek Berlin-Preussischer Kulturbesitz) closed the Nebenzahl program with a fascinating look at the marketing and consumer reception of the celebrated work of the Johann Baptist Homann and his heirs entitled, “Commercial Aspects of the Map Trade in Eighteenth-Century Germany.”

After lunch, Oswald Dreyer-Eimbcke, president of the International Map Collectors’ Society, formally opened the IMCoS’s Twentieth International Symposium. The symposium, hosted by the Newberry Library, the American Geographical Society Collection of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, The Adler Planetarium, the Chicago Map Society, and the Map Society of Wisconsin, was being held for the first time in the American Midwest. First on the agenda was a captivating talk by David Rumsey about his magnificent Web site featuring more than 7,000 high-quality images of historic maps from his personal collection. IMCoS participants were then given the option of touring Chicago by boat, bus, or foot (in a driving rain) with docents from the Chicago Architecture Foundation. The day closed with a reception at the offices of Roger Baskes, a trustee of the Newberry Library, and now president of IMCoS. During the reception our guests had the opportunity to explore Mr. Baskes’s extraordinary collection of atlases, geographies, and guidebooks.

The IMCoS festivities continued on Sunday, October 12. Many participants joined a tour of the private map collections and points of interest of Chicago’s northern suburbs, hosted by Barry MacLean, Art and Jan Holzheimer, and Jack Ringer. Former Smith Center director David Buisseret led others on a daylong tour of the historic Illinois and Michigan Canal corridor. The Chicago-based events were capped by a visit on Sunday evening to the spectacular lakefront site of the Adler Planetarium for a reception a viewing of a portion of the museum’s huge collection of celestial charts and astronomical instruments.

Early Monday morning, everyone boarded buses for a drive northward to the campus of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, which houses the huge research and cartographic collections of the American Geographical Society. The day in Milwaukee began with a reception and viewing of an exhibit of AGS treasures. At lunch the entourage was welcomed by UWM Provost and Vice-Chancellor John A. Wanat and Peter Watson-Boone, Director of the Gold Meir Library, home the AGS Collection. In the afternoon, the group was treated to four engaging papers. Chris Baruth, Curator of the AGS Collection, explained the history of character of the collection. Next, the Newberry’s Curator of Special Collections and Curator of Maps, Robert W. Karrow, Jr., discussed The Future of the Private Map Collection. Ken Nebenzahl shared reminiscences of career as an antiquarian map dealer in an entertaining talk entitled Collections and Collectors; or, Would You Buy an Old and Probably Inaccurate Map from this Man? David Woodward closed the program with a report on the progress and prospects of the History of Cartography Project he heads at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

At the close of the afternoon symposium, everyone boarded buses yet again for a brief tour of Milwaukee, concluding at the new wing of the Milwaukee Art Museum, built by world-famous architect Santiago Calatrava. The awe-inspiring central atrium of the museum was the perfect setting for a concluding banquet and lecture, Did Spain Limit Access to Geographical Information about America in the Eighteenth Century?, given by John Hébert, Chief of the Geography and Map Division of the Library of Congress. Many guests returned to Chicago that evening. Others remained in Milwaukee to participate in a post-conference Fall Tour of Southern Wisconsin, highlighted by visits to Madison and Taliesin, the historic home and architectural school of Frank Lloyd Wright.