Air Age Maps, the Shrinking Globe, and Anglo-American Relations

Stone, Jeffrey P.

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-15468-4_3

Jeffrey P. Stone⁵

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in the History of the Media ((PSHM))

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Abstract

This chapter examines another technological aspect, namely, the impact of the Air Age on British and American news cartography at this time. Tracing its roots to the early 1900s, this age of powered flight prompted both nations’ cartographers to invent or rediscover map projections that better described the roundness of the earth and to apply those projections to World War II and Cold War–era geopolitics. Mapmakers abandoned the flat Mercator projection especially after the “rediscovery” of the world’s Polar Regions led to a new popularity of polar projection maps that became increasingly important as Cold War tensions mounted. Finally, a case study comparing American and British cartographic campaigns to decentralize their respective nation’s urban clusters for fear of Soviet nuclear attack is presented. Nevada Senator Pat McCarran’s bilateral federal commission on decentralization, which promised to boost state commerce and mitigate national losses in a predicted nuclear war, differed greatly from British motives of urban slum clearance and property renewal.

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Notes

1.
Denis Cosgrove, Apollo’s Eye: A Cartographic Genealogy of the Earth in the Western Imagination (Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins Press, 2001), 218–219.
2.
Borden D. Dent, Cartography: Thematic Map Design (3rd ed.) (Oxford: William C. Brown Publishers, 1990), 43–45; Norman J. Thrower, Maps and Man: An Examination of Cartography in Relation to Culture and Civilization (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1972), 162–163.
3.
Ibid.; John Bartholomew, The Advanced Atlas of Modern Geography (London: Meiklejohn and Son, Ltd., 1950), 8.
4.
Thrower, Maps and Civilization: Cartography in Culture and Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999), 237; Maps and Man: An Examination of Cartography in Relation to Culture and Civilization, 162–163.
5.
Susan Schulten, The Geographical Imagination in America, 1880–1950 (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2001), 186–187.
6.
Ibid., 187.
7.
See “Notes from Manywhere,” in the Chicago Tribune, v.53, n.12 (Mar. 20, 1904): 18.
8.
See “Would Curb Survey,” in The Washington Post, n.12,468 (Jun. 29, 1910): 4.
9.
The RMS Titanic sank at 41.73° north latitude.
10.
“Longest Way Over Shortest Sea Path,” in The Washington Post, n.13,107 (Apr. 28, 1912): SM4.
11.
See “Formation Of Icebergs And Their Passage From North,” in the Boston Globe, v.97, n.141 (May 23, 1920): 55.
12.
See “New Outlet for West,” in the Los Angeles Times, n.12,070 (Jun. 26, 1909): 6.
13.
Schulten, 195–196.
14.
John Noble Wilford, The Mapmakers: The Story of the Great Pioneers in Cartography – From Antiquity to the Space Age (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2000), 100–101; Jeremy Black, Maps and Politics (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1997), 31.
15.
J. Paul Goode, “The Homolosine Projection: A New Device for Portraying the Earth’s Surface Entire,” in Annals of the Association of American Geographers, v.15, n.3 (September 1925): 119–125.
16.
Schulten, 187.
17.
Goode, 124.
18.
See “Maps Are Made More Accurate,” in the New York Times, v.77, n.25,474 (Oct. 23, 1927): X18.
19.
Louis M. Lyons, “Shortest Way from Boston to Calcutta Is by Way of the North Pole,” in the Boston Globe (Nov. 29, 1942): B5. Sunday editions of this newspaper do not have volume and issue numbers.
20.
See “Over the Editor’s Desk,” in the Christian Science Monitor, v.36, n.76 (Feb. 26, 1944): WM15.
21.
Lyons, B5.
22.
Erwin Raisz, Atlas of Geography (New York: Global Press Corporation, 1944).
23.
This projection went by many names. It was usually and inaccurately called “Fisher’s projection” in newspapers. Fisher actually preferred the term “polygnomonic icosahedral projection”. But he admitted that “central icosahedral projection” would be easier for the public to accept.
24.
Irving Fisher. “A World Map on a Regular Icosahedron by Gnomonic Projection” in Geographical Review, v.33, n.4 (October 1943): 605–619.
25.
See “Map Problems” in the New York Times, v.93, n.31,298 (Oct. 3, 1943): E9.
26.
Walter Lippmann, U.S. War Aims (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1944), 92.
27.
Joseph J. Corn, The Winged Gospel: America’s Romance with Aviation, 1900–1950 (London and New York: Oxford University Press, 1983), 125.
28.
Susan Schulten, “Richard Edes Harrison and the Challenge to American Cartography” in Imago Mundi, v.50 (1998): 174–175.
29.
Ibid. Schulten, Geographical Imagination in America, 1880–1950, 223.
30.
Schulten, “Richard Edes Harrison and the Challenge to American Cartography,” 174.
31.
Fortune, v.22, n.3 (September 1940): 58.
32.
Schulten, 179.
33.
Ibid., 185.
34.
Ibid.
35.
J.B. Harley, The New Nature of Maps: Essays in the History of Cartography (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001), 154.
36.
Ibid., 155.
37.
Schulten, 180.
38.
Ibid., 185.
39.
Ibid.
40.
Time, v.55, n.1 (Jan. 2, 1950): 36.
41.
Walter Ristow, “Journalistic Cartography” in Surveying and Mapping, v.17, n.4 (October 1957): 384.
42.
See Pan Am ad in Time and Tide, v.27, n.42 (Oct. 19, 1946): 1005. See Spectator, v.177, n.6171 (Oct. 4, 1946): 348.
43.
See BOAC ad in Truth, v.141, n.3670 (Jan. 10, 1947): 45.
44.
“History Makes New Maps” in Life, v.13, n.5 (Aug. 03, 1942): 58.
45.
Schulten, 175–176.
46.
“Airplanes and Maps” in the New York Times, v.42, n.31,074 (Feb. 21, 1943): E8.
47.
See Harrison’s letter entitled “Maps Have Their Limitations” in the New York Times, v.42, n.31,079 (Feb. 26, 1943): 18.
48.
Ibid.
49.
Ibid.
50.
See map entitled “Proximity of War to America” in Serial Map Service, v.2, n.4 (January 1941): map 64.
51.
Cosgrove, 254–255.
52.
See “British Wings,” in the New York Times, v.88, n.29,744 (Jul. 2, 1939): E8.
53.
See “British Wings,” in the New York Times, v.88, n.29,781 (Aug. 8, 1939): E6.
54.
See “British to Open New Air Service,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.59 (Mar. 31, 1940): 2.
55.
See “Empire Airlines Get U.S. Motors,” in the Boston Globe, v.137, n.92 (Apr. 1, 1940): 8.
56.
Gilbert C. Fite and Jim E. Reece, An Economic History of the United States (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1973), 553.
57.
See “6 Flights A Week To Lisbon Planned,” in the New York Times, v.89, n.29,902 (Dec. 7, 1939): 1.
58.
See ad for American Airlines in Newsweek, v.23, n.3 (Jan. 17, 1944): 50. See ad for Garrett Corporation in Newsweek, v.24, n.14 (Oct. 2, 1944): 10.
59.
Saturday Evening Post, v.217, n.19 (Nov. 11, 1944): 80.
60.
Truth, v.138, n.359 (Jul. 6, 1945): 9.
61.
See map entitled “The French Empire” in Serial Map Service, v.7, n.8 (May 1946): map 356–357. An accompanying essay entitled “A Contrast in Empire-Building” stressed the strictly British colonial practice of “extending arteries of sea-borne trade by concentration of land and sea power at strategic points,” while “colonial France, on the other hand, has rested on a basis of assimilation.” See page 91.
62.
See ad for Bristol Airplanes in Truth, v.137, n.3587 (Jun. 6, 1945): 467.
63.
See map entitled “The Massive Retaliatory Power” in Fortune, v.49, n.5 (May 1954): 105.
64.
Marc L.J. Dierkx, “Shaping World Civil Aviation: Anglo-American Civil Aviation, 1944–1946” in The Journal of Air Law and Commerce, v.57 (Spring 1992): 795.
65.
Ibid.
66.
See ad for Pan American Airlines in Newsweek, v.23, n.8 (Feb. 2, 1944): 44–45.
67.
See map entitled “Air Junctions Map No. 2” in Serial Map Service, v.7, n.1 (October 1945): map 323–324.
68.
See map entitled “Air Junctions Map No. 3” in Serial Map Service, v.7, n.2 (November 1945): map 331–332.
69.
Dierkx, 796.
70.
Ibid.
71.
Ibid., 799.
72.
Dierkx, 805.
73.
Ibid., 806.
74.
Ibid.
75.
Ibid., 808.
76.
Ibid., 816.
77.
Ibid.
78.
Ibid., 838.
79.
“Files Billion Plan For World Airline,” the New York Times, v.93, n.31,468 (Mar. 21, 1944): 10.
80.
Ibid.
81.
The only two airlines that supported the McCarran bill were Pan American Airlines and United Airlines—the only two US-based international airlines at the time.
82.
Ibid.; “17 Airlines Fight M’Carran’s Bill,” the New York Times, v.93, n.31,474 (Mar. 26, 1944): 36; “Hearings Planned On Air Monopoly,” the New York Times, v.94, n.31,785 (Feb. 1, 1945): 18; “Army, Navy Oppose One Ocean Air Line,” the New York Times, v.94, n.31,847 (Apr. 5, 1945): 25.
83.
“Competition In Air Urged By 17 Lines,” the New York Times, v.94, n.31,853 (Apr. 10, 1945): 20.
84.
Dierkx, 838.
85.
Ibid.
86.
“Says Britain Tried To Curb Our Flying,” the New York Times, v.95, n.32,177 (Feb. 28, 1946): 10.
87.
See map entitled “B.O.A.C. Routes” in Serial Map Service, v.7, n.6 (March 1946): 63–64.
88.
Cosgrove, 35–36.
89.
The New York Times, v.96, n.32,415 (Oct. 24, 1946): front page.
90.
See ad for Hutchinson Publishers in New Statesman and Nation, v.31, n.781 (Feb. 9, 1946): 95.
91.
See “Japanese In The Aleutians,” in the Hartford Courant, v.106 (Jun. 17, 1942): 10.
92.
Serial Map Service, v.7, n.10 (July 1946): 113.
93.
Serial Map Service, v.8, n.5 (February 1947): 76.
94.
Polyzoides, “Spitsbergen Demand Reveals Red Ambition,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.66 (Jan. 11, 1947): 5.
95.
George Goodall (ed), Cartocraft Geography School Atlas (London: George Philip and Son, 1947).
96.
George Philip, Philip’s Record Atlas (London: London Geographical Institute, 1934).
97.
“The Geography of Post-War Air Routes: Discussion,” in The Geographic Journal, v.103, n.3 (March 1944): 93–96. See map on page 94.
98.
See “An ‘Air Age’ Map of the World,” in Science, v.101, n.2626 (Apr. 27, 1945): 425.
99.
John Bartholomew, The Advanced Atlas of Modern Geography (London: Meiklejohn and Son, Ltd., 1950), 10.
100.
“Secret Cruise of a Russian Submarine” in U.S. News and World Report, v.39, n.11 (Sept. 9, 1955): 21–26.
101.
J.W. Gregory, “Recent Literature on the Plan of the Earth” in Geographical Journal, v.32, n.2 (August 1908): 151–156.
102.
See the United States Geological Survey website: www.3dsoftware.com/Cartography/USGS/MapProjections/Azimuthal/Orthographic/.
103.
John Noble Wilford, The Mapmakers: The Story of the Great Pioneers in Cartography – from Antiquity to the Space Age (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2000), 102.
104.
U.S. News and World Report, v.10, n.18 (May 5, 1941): 9.
105.
Time, v.44, n.7 (Aug. 14, 1944): 24.
106.
Life, v.14, n.13 (Mar. 29, 1943): 61.
107.
Cosgrove, 218.
108.
Kieran Mulvaney, At the Ends of the Earth: A History of Polar Regions (Washington, D.C. and London: Island Press, 2001), 136–137.
109.
New York Times, v.97, n. 32,761 (Oct. 5, 1947): 9.
110.
Newsweek, v.27, n.11 (Mar. 3, 1946): 40.
111.
Time, v.56, n.10 (Oct. 4, 1950): 16.
112.
Mulvaney, 84.
113.
Ibid., 90.
114.
Klaus Dodds, Geopolitics in Antarctica: Views from the Southern Oceanic Rim (Chichester, West Sussex, England: Wiley, 1997), 79–80. See also Mulvaney, 124.
115.
Sagittarius, “Antarctic Chanty” in New Statesman and Nation, v.33 n.838 (Mar. 29, 1947): 1.
116.
John Bartholomew, The Columbus Atlas or Regional Atlas of the World (Edinburgh: John Bartholomew and Son, Ltd., 1954), map 152.
117.
Mulvaney, 124–129.
118.
Gerald Bowman, Men of Antarctica (New York: Fleet Publishing, 1958), 147.
119.
Mulvaney, 119–120.
120.
Kenneth Bertrand, Americans in Antarctica, 1775–1948 (New York: American Geographical Society, 1971), 18.
121.
Mulvaney, 130–131.
122.
Bowman, 96.
123.
Ibid., 97–100.
124.
Ibid., 97.
125.
See “Navy Sends Data To Guide Byrd,” in the New York Times, v.78, n.25,896 (Dec. 18, 1928): 15.
126.
Mulvaney, 132–133.
127.
See “Explorer Pays Britons Honor,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.48 (Apr. 17, 1929): 13.
128.
See “Farthest South,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.48 (Apr. 28, 1929): B4.
129.
Ibid., 135.
130.
H.M.F. “The Battle of Antarctica,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.60 (Feb. 19, 1941): A4.
131.
See “Byrd Suggests Polar Defenses,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.60 (May 2, 1941): A11.
132.
See “Germans in Antarctic, Byrd Party Reports,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.60 (May 6, 1941): 2.
133.
Bowman, 141. See Mulvaney, 135.
134.
See “International Interest in the Antarctic,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.65 (Nov. 24, 1946): A4.
135.
The New York Times, v.96, n.32,509 (Jan. 26, 1947): E10.
136.
Ibid.
137.
Mulvaney, 137–144.
138.
The New York Times, v.97, n.32,901 (Feb. 22, 1948): E4.
139.
See “New Zealand Fears U.S. Force Intends to Stay in Antarctic,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.66 (Dec. 12, 1946): 7.
140.
See “U.S. Reserves Its Claims in Antarctic,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.66 (Dec. 28, 1946): 4.
141.
See “U.S. Plans Claim to Huge Slice of Antarctic Sector,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.66 (Jan. 6, 1947): 1, 2.
142.
K.S. Bartlett, “More Antarctic Surprises Due?” in the Boston Globe, v.151, n.82 (Mar. 23, 1947): A5.
143.
The agreement was made at the 1947 Inter-American Conference held in Quitandinha, Brazil. See “Entire Western Hemisphere Put in New Security Zone,” in the Boston Globe, v.152, n.58 (Aug. 27, 1947): 1. All Western Hemisphere nations signed the treaty except Nicaragua and Ecuador.
144.
Richard E. Byrd, “Why We’re Sailing South,” in the Los Angeles Times, v.66 (Jan. 12, 1947): E4.
145.
See “Ike Won’t Claim Any Portion of Antarctica,” in the Boston Sunday Globe (Aug. 22, 1954): C14. The Sunday edition does not keep volume and issue numbers.
146.
Kenneth Osgood, Total Cold War: Eisenhower’s Secret Propaganda Battle at Home and Abroad (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2006), 156.
147.
See “Scientific Study Links 9 Nations Over Antarctic,” in the Boston Sunday Globe (Nov. 21, 1954): C19.
148.
Saul Pett, “Byrd Greets Reds in Antarctica, Says U.S. Has Covered Their Area,” in the Boston Globe, v.169, n.18 (Jan 18, 1956): 32.
149.
See “Russians Hoist Flag on British Antarctic Area,” in the Boston Globe, v.169, n.45 (Feb. 14, 1956): 7.
150.
Uncle Dudley, “Khrushchev’s Program,” in the Boston Globe, v.169, n.49 (Feb. 18, 1956): 6.
151.
Saturday Evening Post, v.220, n.19 (Nov. 8, 1947): 29.
152.
Cosgrove, 219.
153.
Mulvaney, 84–87.
154.
Cosgrove, 220.

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Stone, J.P. (2019). Air Age Maps, the Shrinking Globe, and Anglo-American Relations. In: British and American News Maps in the Early Cold War Period, 1945–1955. Palgrave Studies in the History of the Media. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-15468-4_3

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-15468-4_3
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