Maps

Maps

How Can Maps Help Me Do Genealogy?

Maps will help you locate the places where your ancestors lived. They identify political boundaries, place names, parishes, geographical features, cemeteries, churches, and migration/transportation routes. Historical maps are especially useful for understanding boundary changes or finding communities that no longer exist. You can find maps at Google Maps, David Rumsey's Historical Maps Collection, Old Maps Online Collection, Library of Congress Maps Collection, Norman B. Leventhal Map & Education Center at the Boston Public Library, [Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection]. You may also find maps at other archives, libraries and historical societies.

Maps are published either individually or as an atlas. An atlas is a bound collection of maps. Use tools like gazetteers, guidebooks, local histories, historical geographies, encyclopedias, and history texts to get the most out of maps.

For more information about how to use maps for research, go to Five Ways to Use Online Historical Maps for Genealogy.

Genealogical information in various types of maps

To select the right kind of map to solve a genealogical problem, it is helpful to know what kinds of information each type of map displays.

• Atlases are bound collections of maps. Historical atlases are especially useful because they tend to plot historic towns and landmarks more accurately than old maps do in relation to jurisdictional boundaries and geographic features.
• Boundary change maps show shifts in borders of townships, counties, states and territories over time.
• Census maps. Spelling errors by census takers often make ancestors hard to find. If you know your ancestor's address (or general area of residence in rural areas), census maps showing enumeration district boundaries can indicate where in the census rolls to search for the ancestor. 
• Chamber of commerce maps, which can usually be obtained for free from city and town chambers of commerce, show streets, government offices, courthouses, libraries, businesses, museum archives, and important landmarks. 
• City and town maps show detailed street information, addresses, rail and mass transit routes, and landmarks.
• City and town locator maps plot a town and often give its coordinates so that it can be plotted in an historical atlas or map to determine the county, parish, or state in which it resided during a given year. 
• City plans often demystify the renaming of streets, parks, neighborhoods, and other features.
• County, Parish, or Province maps show roads, cemeteries, landmarks, local boundaries, and physical features.
• Encyclopedias
• Fire insurance maps (Sanborn maps) of 12,000 cities and towns yield street names and specific properties and addresses starting in 1867. Using these with city directories can help locate urban ancestors in a given year.
• Gazetteers
• Guidebooks
• Historical Geographies
• History Texts
• Land ownership (cadastral) maps and plat books show boundaries of land plots, and usually the owners' names.
• Local histories
• Military maps show extreme detail regarding geographical features, terrain, landmarks, natural resources, place names, and landmarks. 
• Railroad maps indicate preferred routes of travel during an era where the routes changed from one year to the next. These also aid in tracking the possible whereabouts of railroad employees since many railroads merged or changed names. 
• Topographic or geologic maps show terrain, natural resources (forests, mining resources), and features that affected travel (rivers, rapids, canals, mountains, mountain passes, canyons).