Illinois in 1838 - Chicago, Springfield, Peoria
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This Illinois sheet is part of Thomas G. Bradford's 1838 An Illustrated Atlas, published by Weeks, Jordan & Co. and Wiley and Putnam, printed twenty years after Illinois joined the Union. Chicago had only just incorporated as a city the year before, in 1837, with a population still well under 5,000, and the Illinois and Michigan Canal — the project that would eventually link the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River system and turn Chicago into a transportation hub — was under construction but still years from completion. George W. Boynton engraved the map at a scale of about 1:1,700,000.
The Mississippi and Illinois Rivers trace the state's western edge while Lake Michigan anchors the northeast corner, all rendered in the atlas's hand-painted county color — a map drawn at the exact moment Illinois's river-and-canal geography was about to become the foundation of its economic future.
Illinois natives and Chicagoans who've relocated tend to want this one for the state's early-statehood snapshot, and it's a strong addition for a collector working through Bradford's 1838 series. Sold unframed, available in multiple sizes.
