Texas Maps
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This entry was originally written by Wendy Bebout Elliott, Ph.D. FUGA for Red Book: American State, County, and Town Sources.
The GLO (see Texas Land Records) houses original plat maps for the state (see www.glo.state.tx.us/archives/map_description.html). The Archives Division, Texas State Library, maintains an excellent collection of Texas maps. Original, photocopies, and compiled maps include general state, county survey, road and highway, United States Geological Survey, coastal and nautical, street, town plats, and Birdseye maps with card index to the collection, arranged by date or location. James M. Day’s Maps of Texas, 1527–1900: The Map Collection of the Texas State Archives (Austin, Tex.: Pemberton Press, 1964) describes maps in the collection acquired prior to 1965. Other printed sources include:
- Creuzbaur, Robert J. DeCordova’s Map of the State of Texas. Compiled from the Records of the General Land Office (GLO) of the State. Houston: n.p., 1849.
- Day, James M., et al., comps. Maps of Texas, 1527–1900: The Map Collection of the Texas State Archives. Austin, Tex.: Pemberton Press, 1964.
- Frantz, Joe Bertram. Lure of the Land: Texas County Maps and the History of Settlement. College Station, Tex.: Texas A&M University Press, 1988.
- Gamble, W. H. County Map of the State of Texas: Showing Also Portions of the Adjoining States and Territories. Philadelphia: n.p., 1879.
- Gannett, Henry. A Gazetteer of Texas. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1904.
- Gray, O. W. Gray’s Railroad Map of Texas. Philadelphia: the author, 1877.
- Martin, James C., and Robert S. Martin. Maps of Texas and the Southwest, 1513–1900. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1984. Brief historical sketches accompany the maps in this atlas.
- Pool, William C. A Historical Atlas of Texas. Austin, Tex.: Encinco Press, 1975. Maps of the state depict the frontier and various historical periods as well as Indian territories.
- Stephens, A. Ray, and William M. Holmes. Historical Atlas of Texas. Consultant: Phyllis M. McCaffree. Norman, Okla.: University of Oklahoma Press, 1989.
- Tarpley, Fred. 1001 Texas Place Names. Austin, Tex.: University of Texas Press, 1980.
- Texas State Gazetteer and Business Directory. R. L. Polk and Co., 1882–83, 1884–85, 1890–91. These directories provide a means to identifying business owners in Texas towns as well as locating communities that have disappeared.
- Webb, Walter Prescott, and Eldon Stephen Branda. The Handbook of Texas. 3 vols. Austin, Tex.: Texas State Historical Association, 1952–76.
- Wheat, James L. Postmasters and Post Offices in Texas, 1846–1930. N.p.: n.p., 1973. Provides most complete list of communities.
Other map collections are housed in the libraries of the University of Texas at Austin and El Paso http://libraries.uta.edu/SpecColl/mapcoll.html and Southern Methodist University DeGrolyer Library www.smu.edu/cul/degolyer/collections.html.
