1976 Archar / Dodds 'City Character Print' View Map of New Orleans, Louisiana

This is a 1976 Tom Dodds 'City Character Print' view map of New Orleans, Louisiana.

A Closer Look

Oriented toward the north with Lake Pontchartrain along the top border, city landmarks, including monuments, stadiums, and university buildings, appear alongside businesses, schools, and other locations. The famed French Quarter is to the right, with the Liberty Monument, the Joan of Arc statue, and the Mardi Gras parade identifying this raucous part of the city. The New Orleans Superdome appears almost at the center and is home to the NFL's New Orleans Saints and the NBA's New Orleans Jazz (now the Utah Jazz). Many of the largest buildings are the city's hotels (drawn larger than scale). Riverboats, shipping vessels, and an aircraft carrier ply the waters of the mighty Mississippi River. The Armstrong International Airport (KMSY) appears along the left border with a Concorde landing on its runway. (Yes, the Concorde did land in New Orleans. The event depicted here is the March 24, 1976, state visit of French President Valery Giscard d’Estain. Later, in 1981, British Airways began operating limited Concorde flights to New Orleans as part of a promotional service aimed at boosting tourism and business ties between the United Kingdom and the United States.) Along the bottom border, a New Orleans jazz band occupies the left corner while the Battle of New Orleans between Andrew Jackson and the Americans and the British red coats rages in the lower right corner.

City Character Prints

City Character Prints were a series of comical city views issued between 1972 and 1983. The views combine cartographic perspective with exaggerated illustrations of important landmarks, historical sites, and 'typical' people engaged in 'typical' activities. The views were produced by different artists, with, as far as we can tell, every artist having produced only one. Some are unattributed. Cities covered include New Orleans, St. Louis, Birmingham, New York, Syracuse, Philadelphia, Dallas, Buffalo, Chicago, Austin, Washington D.C., Miami, and Phoenix, among others. Most bear the Canadian imprint of Archar Inc., Ontario. Many were later licensed as puzzles. We even note a map of Singapore, dating to 1990, that uses the term 'City Character Print', and while mimicking the style and produced by a Canadian artist, it may or may not be related. The style inspired a whole genre of copycat works of perseverant popularity.

Publication History and Census

This map was illustrated by Tom Dodds and published by Archar, Inc. in 1976 as part of their City Design Print series. We note a single cataloged example in OCLC, which is part of the collection at the Library of Congress.