Crossings invites you to take four historic routes across the United States.

Maps, guidebooks, travelogues, postcards, and more from the Newberry’s collection recreated travelers’ experiences along the northern and southern borders of the US, across the continent's interior, and up and down the Mississippi River.

These cross-country paths have been in use for centuries whether by water, railroad, car, or airplane. And they've remained remarkably consistent despite changes in transportation, commerce, and the people who’ve used them.

But not everyone has experienced travel and mobility equally. The same paths meant “discovery” to the European explorer, freedom to the enslaved, and loss and removal for Indigenous nations.

Crossings showed how centuries of movement––from the Lewis and Clark expedition to the American road trip––have forged deep relationships between people and places that survive to this day.

Crossings: Mapping American Journeys was generously supported by Rand McNally, the National Endowment for the Humanities, Jossy and Ken Nebenzahl, and Andrew and Jeanine McNally.

Digital Resources

• Maps as Heritage: Commemoration and Travel in American Cartography -  This Collection Essay selects and pairs a variety of maps from the exhibit to document how episodes of American history are converted into artifacts of heritage and catalysts for tourism.
• United States Expansion, Migrants, and Transportation Technologies, ca. 1810-1930 - The maps and texts in this Collection Essay convey the complex and often violent history of US westward expansion, as well as the diversity of migration experiences and migrants.
• Mapping the Underground Railroad: Landscapes of Defiance and Ingenuity - In this visualization made by Karen Lewis, Siebert's map and personal memoirs are used to tell the stories of three survivors--Edward Moxley, Eliza Harris, William Wells Brown--and their journeys to freedom.