Tom Paper: "Mistakes on Maps”

Sponsored in partnership with California, Chicago, New York, Philip Lee Phillips, Rocky Mountain, and Texas Map Societies.

Location: Zoom

Time:  7:00 PM ET/ 6:00 PM CT/ 5:00 PM MT/ 4:00 PM PT

Title: “Mistakes on Maps”

Speaker: Tom Paper, Managing Partner, Western Pacific, LLC; California Map Society, Board of Directors Member at Large

Summary: Originally presented to the California Map Society and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, this presentation is a witty, visually immersive journey through 20 historical maps, each featuring a fascinating flaw. Encounter sea monsters in the 1539 Carta Marina, the phantom continent of Terra Australis, California drawn as an island, the Open Polar Sea, canals on Mars, and the Mountains of Kong. Were these errors accidents, ambition, propaganda or fear of empty space? Along the way, see how trade, empire, faith and imagination bent geography. Through projected maps, story and music, this lecture reveals how cartographers got it wrong, and what their errors reveal about us.

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