Early Map of the Transmississippi West to Upper or New California and Oregon Territory
An usual outline color example of this scarce early map of the Transmississippi West, published by J.H. Colton at the outset of the Gold Rush.
The map identifies the Oregon Trail, noting "The figures on the Oregon Route denote the distance in Miles from Westport Landing, Mo." Fremont's Route is also shown, as is General Kearny's Route of 1846, the Santa Fe Trail and Humboldt's "Supposed Residence of the Aztecs of the 12th Century." James Bonneville's route along the Snake and Columbia Rivers to Fort Walla Walla is also shown, one of the earliest expeditions through Oregon Territory.
The map notes the "Gold Region" in California and makes a credible attempt at depicting the topographical detail of the Western Slope of the Sierra Nevada Mountains and the many rivers flowing westward toward the Central Valley.
A number of early Western Forts are located the Columbia River and the "Snake R or Lewis Fork of the Columbia R.", which reaches nearly to "Jacksons" and "Three Tetons," to the east of Fort Hall. "Mormon Settlement" and "Mormon Fort" area located on the eastern edge of L. Bonneville or Great Salt Lake,
The map was intended to illustrate the route of Captain James Bonneville, one of the earliest explorers of the American West, and appears in at least 1 rare 1849 California Gold Rush guide book. Benjamin Louis Eulalie de Bonneville immigrated to the United States in 1803, graduating from West Point in 1815, achieving the rank of captain in 1825. In 1832 he took a 3 year leave of absence from the army to lead an expedition supposedly to trap and trade in the Wyoming Territory, although it is believed he was in fact spying on foreign activities in the West. The expedition was one of the earliest to provide substantial information of the yet unexplored territories in the eastern part of what was then Oregon Territory, information that found its way onto the present map.
One of the best obtainable maps of the West at the outset of the Gold Rush.
G. W. & C. B. Colton was a prominent family firm of mapmakers who were leaders in the American map trade in the nineteenth century. Its founder, Joseph Hutchins Colton (1800-1893), was a Massachusetts native. Colton did not start in the map trade; rather, he worked in a general store from 1816 to 1829 and then as a night clerk at the United States Post Office in Hartford, Connecticut. By 1830, he was in New York City, where he set up his publishing business a year later.
The first printed item with his imprint is dated 1833, a reprint of S. Stiles & Company’s edition of David Burr’s map of the state of New York. He also printed John Disturnell’s map of New York City in 1833. Colton’s next cartographic venture was in 1835, when he acquired the rights to John Farmer’s seminal maps of Michigan and Wisconsin. Another early and important Colton work is his Topographical Map of the City and County of New York and the Adjacent Country (1836). In 1839, Colton began issuing the Western Tourist and Emigrant’s Guide, which was originally issued by J. Calvin Smith.
During this first decade, Colton did not have a resident map engraver; he relied upon copyrights purchased from other map makers, most often S. Stiles & Company, and later Stiles, Sherman & Smith. Smith was a charter member of the American Geographical and Statistical Society, as was John Disturnell. This connection would bear fruit for Colton during the early period in his career, helping him to acquire the rights to several important maps. By 1850, the Colton firm was one of the primary publishers of guidebooks and immigrant and railroad maps, known for the high-quality steel plate engravings with decorative borders and hand watercolors.
In 1846, Colton published Colton’s Map of the United States of America, British Possessions . . . his first venture into the wall map business. This work would be issued until 1884 and was the first of several successful wall maps issued by the firm, including collaborative works with D.G. Johnson. From the 1840s to 1855, the firm focused on the production of railroad maps. Later, it published a number of Civil War maps.
In 1855, Colton finally issued his first atlas, Colton’s Atlas of the World, issued in two volumes in 1855 and 1856. In 1857 the work was reduced to a single volume under the title of Colton’s General Atlas, which was published in largely the same format until 1888. It is in this work that George Woolworth (G. W.) Colton’s name appears for the first time.
Born in 1827 and lacking formal training as a mapmaker, G. W. joined his father’s business and would later help it to thrive. His brother Charles B. (C. B.) Colton would also join the firm. Beginning in 1859, the General Atlas gives credit to Johnson & Browning, a credit which disappears after 1860, when Johnson & Browning launched their own atlas venture, Johnson’s New Illustrated (Steel Plate) Family Atlas, which bears Colton’s name as the publisher in the 1860 and 1861 editions.
J.H. Colton also published a number of smaller atlases and school geographies, including his Atlas of America (1854-56), his Illustrated Cabinet Atlas (1859), Colton’s Condensed Cabinet Atlas of Descriptive Geography (1864) and Colton’s Quarto Atlas of the World (1865). From 1850 to the early 1890s, the firm also published several school atlases and pocket maps. The firm continued until the late 1890s, when it merged with a competitor and then ceased to trade under the name Colton.