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Bancroft's Map of California, Nevada, Utah and Arizona,
29 3/4 x 32 1/4 inches, Lithographed folding map with full, original hand color, here flattened, with original cloth covers separate; excellent.
A bright, vibrant example of a map of California and the western states by "the greatest map publisher of the Pacific Coast" (Wheat). The map descended from what Wheat called "the great 'map of the Pacific states'"--that of William H. Knight, published in 1863, also by the Bancroft firm.
The present map was one of the earliest on which Phoenix appeared; it was settled in 1867 though not incorporated until 1881 and so is here called "Phoenix Settleme." Also, compared to the 1864 first issue of this map (this one is the fourth), Arizona has been extensively updated, especially in the central mountain region north of Phoenix and in the correction of the course of the Colorado River. Also added to this edition in southern Arizona and California are the Texas Pacific Railroad and the proposed Southern Pacific line as well as several roads and trails. The same can be said for most the map with many railroads both completed and proposed on this issue that are not found on the first. Also on the map the transcontinental railroad is now seen as completed at Promontory Point near the northern rim of the Great Salt Lake. Park City is here identified by its original name, "Parley's Park."
The map notes various natural features (buttes, craters, springs, etc.), mining districts, rivers large and small, wells, distinctive land formations, and topographic features. Despite its relatively large scale, the density of information on it, in California at least, is truly remarkable.
* Wheat, Transmissippi West, no. 1093, pp. 104-106; Rumsey 0046.
Price: $1,950.00