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Description

1860s Minnesota-Wisconsin Railway Wall Map.

Antique wall map of Minnesota and Wisconsin, lithographed and colored by hand, showing the railroad, potential extensions, and tributaries of the Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway.

The map differentiates four kinds of railroads in its key:

Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway 261 Miles                 Colored [solid red]
"                       "       Contemplated Extension         Colored [dashed red]
Roads used by Mil: & St. Paul Railway 108 Miles   Colored [solid blue]
Roads under contract and being Constructed
Tributary to Mil: & St. Paul Railway,
                   Winona to Owatonia        80 Miles
                   Owatonia to Minneapolis 60 Miles
                   St. Paul to Watab             80 Miles
                                                          220 Miles         Colored [brown]

The Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway

The railroad that became the Milwaukee Road began as the Milwaukee and Waukesha Railroad in Wisconsin, whose goal was to link the developing Lake Michigan port city of Milwaukee with the Mississippi River. The company incorporated in 1847 but changed its name to the Milwaukee and Mississippi Railroad in 1850 before construction began.  As a result of the financial panic of 1857, the Milwaukee and Mississippi Railroad (M&M) went into receivership in 1859 and was purchased by the Milwaukee and Prairie du Chien in 1861. In 1867, Alexander Mitchell combined the M&PdC with the Milwaukee and St. Paul (formerly the LaCrosse & Milwaukee Railroad Company) under the name Milwaukee and St. Paul. Critical to the development and financing of the railroad was the acquisition of significant land grants. Prominent individual investors in the line included Alexander Mitchell, Russell Sage, Jeremiah Milbank, and William Rockefeller.  The railroad would eventually come to be known as the Milwaukee Road.

Unrecorded in OCLC.

Condition Description
Fair-condition wall map. Original wooden dowels, linen-backing, and selvage. Varnish darkened and somewhat brittle with a few attendant cracks. Dampstain along left and right edges, and particularly in the top margin, where it has caused some stronger staining and paper cracking (not into the image). Dampstain also proceeding down into the top half of the map. The map would benefit from professional conservation and is priced accordingly. All of the map image is present and original.
G.W. Colton Biography

G. W. & C. B. Colton was a prominent family firm of mapmakers who were leaders in the American map trade in the nineteenth century. The business was founded by Joseph Hutchins Colton (1800-1893).  who bought copyrights to existing maps and oversaw their production. By the 1850s, their output had expanded to include original maps, guidebooks, atlases, and railroad maps. Joseph was succeeded by his sons, George Woolworth (1827-1901) and Charles B. Colton (1831-1916). The firm was renamed G. W. & C. B. Colton as a result. George is thought responsible for their best-known work, the General Atlas, originally published under that title in 1857. In 1898, the brothers merged their business and the firm became Colton, Ohman, & Co., which operated until 1901, when August R. Ohman took on the business alone and dropped the Colton name.