George Washington and His Maps

In Smithsonian, there's a discussion about how our first president used cartography to get a feel of the young nation.

From the article...

First in war.

First in peace.

First to look at a map whenever he had a question about waging the former and sustaining the latter.

It’s not how we typically picture George Washington: bent over a map by candlelight, scrutinizing, measuring and in some cases actually drawing the topographical details that would help conquer a wilderness, win a war, create a republic. But as historian Barnet Schecter shows us in his illustrated new history, George Washington’s America: a Biography through His Maps, many of our first president’s decisions during his long career as a surveyor, soldier and statesman were made only after careful readings of the existing cartographical materials.