The History Center in Tompkins County

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MAPS

Our Archives have over 1,200 maps in its collection. These can be viewed or used by researchers during Research Library open hours. Any unauthorized reproduction is strictly prohibited. Please contact the History Center for authorization to print the maps (please note there is a reproduction fee).

Ithaca Bird's Eye View 1873
Ithaca Bird's Eye View 1882
Revised Map of Bryant Park 1911
City of Ithaca 1896
Colton's Railroad New York 1852
Ithaca Lithograph, S. Currier Lithography
Ithaca 1840
Ithaca and Athens Railroad
Ithaca Manuscript Map
Lake View Cemetery, 1894, William Webster
Lansing and Ludlowville Turnpike, 1894, James Reed
New York State 1796
Northern Pacific Railway
Tompkins County 1829, David Burr
Tompkins County 1903
Tompkins County 1905
Tompkins County School Districts 1935
Tompkins County Child Gazetteer Map
Tompkins County Soil Map 1905
Town of Ulysses

History Forge: The Importance of Maps from Mark Hartsuyker on Vimeo.

Thanks to multiple digitization projects with community partners over the years, you can access some of The History Center map collection through the links below:

History Center Historic Maps

Tompkins County Public Library Local Maps & Atlases

HistoryForge Database

Bell Hecht's Scanned Images for Tompkins County

DIGITAL MAPPING PROJECTS

Tompkins County HistoryForge - tompkins.historyforge.net - County overview and township detail maps from 1800s-1950. Includes searchable census and building records
Historical Markers in NYS - hmdb.org - Independent project mapping historic markers and road signs
Tompkins County Rural Black Residents Project - Independent project exclusively mapping census records of Black residents in Tompkins County during 1800s

HISTORY CENTER MAP COLLECTIONS

City of Ithaca Maps - 1836, 1851, 1872, and more...
Maps of Tompkins County - 1853, 1935, and more...
1866 Atlas of Tompkins County
Birds' Eye Views of Ithaca - 1873 and 1882
Military Tract Map and Balloting Book - 1825
Sanborn Insurance Maps of Ithaca - 1893, 1904, 1910, 1919, 1961, and 1965

and over 1,200 more...

The History Center in Tompkins County · Maps in the History Center Archives

MODERN MAPS OF TOMPKINS COUNTY

For modern maps of Tompkins County, we encourage you to explore the resources on the Tompkins

County Mapping Portal, maintained by the Tompkins County IT Department.

SANBORN MAPS AND HISTORYFORGE

The Tompkins County HistoryForge project uses maps from the Sanborn Fire Insurance Atlas of Ithaca for 1910. The Sanborn maps were done for every village, town and city in the United States about every seven to eight years from roughly 1880 to 1930. The Library of Congress has a very complete collection. The collection has been only very partly digitized but the Library’s site features a complete list of all the maps. Read an excellent article titled "Introduction to the Sanborn Map Collection" featured on the Library of Congress webpage.

The Sanborn maps are very large scale maps and show every building in considerable detail. The maps are color-coded for construction materials and other features are displayed using a set of symbols that remained in use throughout the publication history. Commercial properties are heavily annotated so that the insurance underwriter could estimate risk.

Locally there is a very complete set for the City of Ithaca although this is scattered over four different collections. The Tompkins County Public Library has digitized The History Center’s collection and made them available online. These are being rescanned at a higher resolution and uploaded to the HistoryForge site, where they will be geo-rectified. There is a fairly complete set for Trumansburg at the Ulysses Historical Society. Dryden has a full set of black and white three-quarter-sized reprints.

Explore the HistoryForge Database