We Are One: Mapping America’s Road from Revolution to Independence

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“We Are One: Mapping America’s Road from Revolution to Independence”
Boston Public Library, May 2-November 29, 2015
Colonial Williamsburg, February 2016 - January 2017
New-York Historical Society, November 2017 – March 2018

This exhibition uses maps to explore the tumultuous events that led thirteen colonies to forge a new nation. Maps were central to the revolutionary process. John Mitchell’s 1755 map of the colonies helped galvanize the British to support the French and Indian War, while European maps helped legitimate the independent status of the United States. “We Are One” features maps as well as prints, paintings, and objects. Curators selected these items from the Leventhal Map Center’s own collection and those of twenty partners, including the British Library, Library of Congress, and private collectors.

As tensions between Britain and her American colonies erupted into war, cartographers and artists depicted military campaigns, local geography, and landscapes. These maps and drawings provided early pictorial representations of the North American colonies and the Atlantic World that bring the struggle for independence to life.

Learn more at our exhibition website: http://maps.bpl.org/WeAreOne

 

Also, visit the American Revolution Portal Database:
Researchers can now access revolutionary-era maps from leading cartographic collections around the world with one search. The American Revolution Portal features maps that from the French and Indian War (1754-1763) to the early days of the new republic. The collection focuses on maps of European colonies in North America and the Atlantic world. Users can download them for research or classroom use.

The Leventhal Map Center partnered with institutions such as the British Library, Library of Congress, American Antiquarian Society, and Harvard University to digitize their maps and make them searchable. This year, the National Endowment for the Humanities awarded the Leventhal Map Center a grant that will facilitate the addition of new collections and digital tools to the American Revolution Portal.

Visit maps.bpl.org/weareone to access the portal and zoominginonhistory.com to view our collection of georeferenced maps from the exhibition.