Association of American Geographers
1710 Sixteenth Street, NW
Washington, DC  20009-3198
 
"Columbus Maps Find Home:  Quincentenary Exhibition Highlights
Discovery"
 
     The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee is to be the home of a
major exhibition of rare maps for the 1992 Columbus Quincen-
tennial.  The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded
the University a grant of $280,000 in direct funds and a further
$100,000 in matching support for "Maps and the Columbian
Encounter".  The project will be a part of the international
events and celebrations being planned for the 500th anniversary
of Columbus's first voyage of discovery.
     The Exhibition is a collaborative effort of the American
Geographical Society Collection, The Newberry Library of Chicago,
the James Ford Bell Library of the University of Minnesota, and
the William L. Clements Library of the University of Michigan. 
Drawing from the combined resources of these collections "Maps
and the Columbian Encounter" will present maps from the 14th
through 16th centuries, as records of contemporary perceptions,
knowledge, technologies, and political events.  Seeking to answer
not only the question "What does the map show?" the Exhibition
also asks "What did the maps mean to the men and women of the
Encounter period?" and "What do they mean to modern Americans?"
     Through the end of 1992 "Maps and the Columbian Encounter"
will provide a major regional resource for marking the Quincen-
tennial.  In addition to the Exhibition of original items,
facsimiles of the Exhibition will be manufactured for showings at
sites through the Midwest beginning in 1990.  Coordinating
offices have already been established in Illinois, Michigan, and
Minnesota with plans underway to provide a national distribution.
     The original maps will be on display in 1992 with showings
at each of the collaborating institutions.  The Exhibition tour
will end in October 1992 with an installation at the Milwaukee
Public Museum.  Along with the Exhibition there will be educa-
tional materials and programs, bibliographies, public lectures
and scholarly programs.
     For further information, please contact Mark Warhus, Project
Coordinator, The Office for Map History, American Geographical 
Society Collection, University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, WI 
53201.  Phone:  (414) 229-4101.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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