Vermont & New Hampshire Map 1845 Regional Print - Montpelier, Concord, Burlington

Sidney Morse and Samuel Breese, working in New York, published this combined map of Vermont and New Hampshire in 1845 as part of Morse's North American Atlas, issued by Harper & Brothers across nine illustrated parts sold for twenty-five cents apiece. Morse and Breese pioneered the cerographic wax-engraving process used here, a technique cheaper than copper-plate engraving that let Harper's price the atlas within reach of ordinary households, and this particular sheet shows relief by hachures across both states' mountain ranges, a level of terrain detail not every map in the series attempted. Both states are shown as long-settled parts of New England, their populations and township boundaries essentially stable by this date even as the region's economic center of gravity was already beginning to shift toward the textile mills of southern New England.

Montpelier anchors the Vermont side as the state capital, a small town tucked among the Green Mountains chosen more for its central position than any commercial importance. Concord serves the same role for New Hampshire, seated on the Merrimack River in the state's interior. Burlington appears on the Vermont side as the state's principal commercial center, its position on Lake Champlain making it a natural trade link to Canada and New York. The White Mountains rise across northern New Hampshire and the Connecticut River divides the two states along their shared border, and around both features lay a rural, hill-country landscape settled a full generation earlier by New England farming families.

This paired sheet offers Vermont and New Hampshire in a single, well-matched view, ideal for a New England family with roots in either state or a collector assembling the region one sheet at a time. The store's other editions covering these states include the 1893 and 1883 Cram sheets, an 1882 edition, an 1840 issue, and a five-state 1874 sheet adding Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut; this 1845 Morse map is the earliest paired Vermont-New Hampshire sheet in the collection. It's printed unframed and available in a range of sizes to fit whatever wall it's headed for.