Catalog Archive
Auction 202, Lot 236

"Map of the State of New Hampshire", Shurtleff/McMillin

Subject: New Hampshire

Period: 1926 (dated)

Publication:

Color: Printed Color

Size:
23.1 x 33.4 inches
58.7 x 84.8 cm
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This lighthearted pictorial map of the New Hampshire was created by Elizabeth Shurtleff and Helen McMillin. It is packed with humorous illustrations and text poking fun at the state. Some of the more enjoyable notes include: "To Utah, B. Young"; "There goes Governor Wentworth, our first summer tourist"; "What's Daniel [Webster] saying about me down there"; and "You can't cut these trees - they belong to Uncle Sam!". The map is further decorated by swirls of ribbon with various state seals, a large compass rose, and a banner title cartouche.

Elizabeth Shurtleff (1890 - 1968) was a painter and artist born in Concord, New Hampshire and educated at Boston Museum School of Fine Arts. Helen F. McMillin (1896 - 1987) was an editor, publisher, and illustrator from North Adams, Massachusetts, who studied at Wellesley College and published Granite Monthly and worked for the Museum of Modern Art. From 1926 to 1930, the two women designed a group of pioneering pictorial maps, published by their own company, the Graphic History Association. They were key figures in the cluster of women mapmakers who shaped the aesthetics and conventions of pictorial cartography in the early 20th century.

References: Hornsby (Picturing America) pp. 22-23 & 48.

Condition: B+

Issued folding with a few tiny separations along the folds. There are pinholes in the corners and in the border, including two holes in the right corners causing tiny portions of loss to map border.

Estimate: $240 - $300

Sold for: $180

Closed on 2/12/2025

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