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1940 Hagstrom Map of New York City and its Tourist Attractions
NewYorkCityHighSpots-hagstrom-1940$125.00
Title
Hagstrom's Map of High Spots in New York.
1940 (undated) 29.25 x 15.75 in (74.295 x 40.005 cm)
1940 (undated) 29.25 x 15.75 in (74.295 x 40.005 cm)
Description
This is a 1940 Hagstrom map of New York City. Highlighting sites throughout the city, many with small pictorial icons, the map caters to the casual sightseer by marking tourist sites and the more dedicated visitor in chronicling nightclubs and theaters.
The Map
Hagstrom - already known for his judicious distortion of street size for the sake of clarity and legibility - has outdone himself here by stripping away all but New York's 'principal streets.' The space this afforded him has been used for the presentation of important landmark buildings, and even pictorial representation of key neighborhoods (note the musicians and dancers in Harlem, the painter at an easel in Greenwich Village, and a mustachioed braumeister at the corner of Lexington and 86th, then still the center of New York's German immigrant community.) 122 sites are numerically marked and keyed to a list below the map. Bridges and tunnels are drawn with either automobiles or trains. The Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel is a dashed line: it would not open until 1950. At the bottom of the image is a westward-oriented bird's-eye view of the city skyline, labeling Downtown, Midtown, and key features of the skyline employing the same number system used in the map above.The Index
The margins of the map are filled with useful features for visitors, particularly those falling outside the bounds of the map or not evident upon it. Airports and bus terminals are listed (but not railway stations, which presumably were sufficiently prominent on the map itself). Amusement parks, beaches, municipal buildings, churches and synagogues, night and supper clubs, colleges, department stores, and theaters are also noted.Publication History and Census
Although the map does not bear an official publication date, the rapidly shifting addresses for 'Night and Supper Clubs' bear the notation 'as of January 1940.' We know of two other editions that bear the notation 'as of October 1945' and 'as of Jan 1, 1949' for nightclub addresses.Cartographer
Andrew Gunnar Hagstrom (1890 - September 24, 1977) was a map publisher based in Maspeth, Queens. Hagstrom was a Swedish immigrant who came to new York in 1909 where took work milking cows at a farm near Coney Island, Brooklyn. He then worked in the meat packing industry while taking a degree in commercial art at the New York Mechanics Institute. Afterwords he founded a drafting business in Manhattan, creating a map to illustrate his drafting skill help customers locate his shop. His map proved popular and he expanded operations, founding the Hagstrom Map Company (1916 - 1968) and issuing additional maps of various parts of New York City and the surrounding regions. By 1949, Hagstrom had issued more than 150 maps, guides, and atlases, most of which focused on New York. Hagstrom pioneered a cartographic style that exaggerated street size to increase clarity and create additional room for large print readable labeling. Even the New York Subway system hired Hagstrom to produce its map, which was in use from the 1940s to 1958. Hagstrom died in 1977, at the age of 81. Hagstrom was knighted by the King of Sweden. His company flourished until 1968 when it was acquired by Macmillan. The brand has since passed through multiple corporate portfolios and is currently the property by Kappa Publishing Group. More by this mapmaker...
Condition
Very good. Light wear along original fold lines. Verso repairs to fold separations. Reinforced where previously attached to binder.