Going Postal

Maps, like any text, create arguments not just with the information they include but also the information they obscure and omit. “Geography of the Post” is no exception. The project tracks the westward spread of the postal service during the second half of the 19th century via an interactive map. Dragging a slider over a window of time – as small as a single year or as broad as the entire latter half of the century – alters the content of the map to show which parts of the country had active post offices during that period.

As you might imagine, selecting only the year 1850 gives you a mostly blank map, with only a sprinkling of light blue dots, each one representing a post office, in northern California. Interestingly, the map’s creators only chose to account for the post offices west of the hundredth meridian. This means that even with the last few years of the timeline highlighted, the right half of the US is eerily and entirely blank. Of course, it doesn’t take any great detective work to gather that there were in fact plenty of active post offices in the other half, nor is it hard to imagine how the map would look if it were “complete.” Still, this decision affects the map’s appearance and visual arguments in a way similar to how one’s reading of a painting might change if half its canvas were left blank or without color. It suggests, however subtly, that the narrative of westward expansion of the postal service is somehow more important than the continued development of post offices in the east, and creates a visual dichotomy between the two regions.

I wouldn’t go so far as to say that this diminishes the usefulness of the map, though, especially because you can simply zoom in and restrict your own view to the west, thus tossing out the un-labeled eastern region entirely. Still, even with this focused lens, certain things become obscured by the creators’ decision to track the opening and closing of post offices over time… and nothing else. As my group talked during our presentation of the site in class, there are no geographical features or city labels to tell a more complete story of why post offices sprung up in certain regions at certain times. As with most texts, we are only given a small sliver of a grand picture, and must work as historians to connect the dots.

Note: At the time of writing this I think I’m the first person to post about the maps we looked at last week. I’d rather wait to reference a post on the same topic than to try to bring in an older one. Once someone else posts I’ll edit/comment on my own with a reference to theirs.

Link to the project: http://cameronblevins.org/gotp/