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Laura L. Whitlock, "the official mapmaker of Los Angeles County" during the teens and "the only woman map publisher in the country" at that point.

Laura was born in Iowa but migrated west with her mother, first to Nebraska and later to Los Angeles in 1895. She again taught music at 6th and Hill, but by 1901, she took a job at a florist who shared quarters with a tourist information bureau.

In 1907, she was selected president of the Pacific Coast Travel club and commenced her career making and selling maps. During this time she studied all manner of railroad and engineering maps and put together six plates of an official map of the city, while working out of her office in the Los Angeles Times building. Unfortunately, all of these originals were destroyed when the Times building was bombed on October 1, 1910, forcing her to rebuild from scratch, while defending against pirated copies of her maps.

She became an aggressive litigant, preserving her map copyrights. Ultimately winning a substantial settlement. 


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