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Description

Early Mapping of Southern California and Southern Arizona --  Orange County to Tucson

Early mapping of Southern California, southwestern Arizona, northern Baja California and Sonora, published in Brussels.

The California Coastline is shown from San Juan Capistrano in the north to the Bay of San Francisco in Baja Norte, centered on San Diego and Ensenada.  The Mission San Luis Rey and San Mission are located as are several Missions in Baha Norte.  In the interior of California and southern Arizona, a number of indigenous tribes are located on either side of the Colorado River.

Along the Gila, the ruins of Casa  Grande are noted, with a reference to the ancient Indian tribes of the region.

Nice detail in southern Arizona, including "Presidio de Tucson" and the Cocomaricopas Indians. Early roads are noted in Southern Arizona.

In Mexico, San Felipe Bay is named, with the map extending to Isla Angel de la Garda and the area around Bahia de Los Angeles.

This map is from Vandermaelen's truly amazing 6 volume atlas, which if combined as globe gores forms an immense globe. Vandermaelen accomplished the first atlas mapping of the world on a uniform scale. His treatment of the Western US is a landmark in the history the cartography of the Western US, undertaking to map in 20 sheets a region which American publishers were virtually ignoring.

Philippe Marie Vandermaelen Biography

Philippe Marie Vandermaelen (1795-1869) was a Belgian cartographer and geographer known for his pioneering use of technology and his leadership in establishing the important Establissement geographique de Bruxelles. Born in Brussels, Philippe was obsessed with maps from a young age. He taught himself mathematics, astronomy, and mapmaking and plotted the battles of the Napoleonic wars avidly. He took over his father’s soapmaking business briefly in 1816, but then turned it over to his brother in favor of cartography.

From 1825 to 1827, he released his first atlas, the Atlas universal, which was well received. It was sold in forty installments of ten maps each, with 810 subscribers listed. The atlas contained 387 maps in six volumes at a uniform scale of 1:1.6 million. The maps were intended to be joined and together would create a globe 7.755 meters wide. It was the first atlas to show the entire world on a large uniform scale and was the first atlas produced using lithography. This project served as Vandermaelen’s gateway into intellectual life, gaining him membership in the Royal Academy of Sciences and Belles-Lettres of Brussels (1829).

In 1830, Vandermaelen inherited a laundry from his parents which he converted into the Establissement geographique de Bruxelles, or the Brussels Geographical Establishment. His brother, Jean-Francois, also established a botanical garden on the site. The Establishment had its own lithographic press, one of the first to use the technology for cartography and the first in Belgium. They produced textbooks, surveys, and especially maps of Brussels to be used for urban planning. The complex also housed schools, an ethnographic museum, and a library open to the public. Vandermaelen was passionate about geographic education and saw the Establishment as an open place where people could learn about the world.

In 1836, he was knighted for his services to geography and the intellectual community of Belgium. He died at age 73 in Molenbeek-Saint-Jean, near the Geographical Establishment that he founded. After Vandermaelen’s death, the Geographical Establishment declined, closing its doors in 1880. The extraordinary collection they had amassed passed to several institutions, most importantly the Royal Library of Belgium.