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Map of the County of Suffolk.
Ithaca: Stone & Clark, 1840. Engd by Rawdon Clark & Co[,] Albany & Rawdon, Wright & Co[,] N. York. Hand-colored engraving, 18.125” x 33” plus margins (side margins extended). CONDITION: Very good. A pleasing map of Suffolk County, New York, from David Burr’s Atlas of the State of New York. Originally published in 1830 (dated 1829), it is only the second atlas entirely devoted to a U.S. state, following Robert Mills’ atlas of South Carolina. This edition is a republication from 1840. This fine map—Plate No. 5 in Burr’s atlas—encompasses Suffolk County, which comprises most of the eastern part of Long Island and various islands in the Long Island Sound. It shows the county’s eight towns as they appeared in 1829. From east to west these are: Huntington, Islip, Smithtown, Brookhaven, Riverhead, South Hampton, Southold, and East Hampton. Fishers Island—administered by New York as part of Southold town but disputed by Connecticut until 1879—is interestingly not included within the red county boundaries. An “Explanations” key in the lower left identifies stage roads, county roads, villages, “flouring mills,” “manufactories,” forges, saw mills, and churches. Additional features depicted on the map include lighthouses, harbors, beaches, and the Long Island Rail Road, which runs the length of the county, as well as the Shinnecock Indian Nation in South Hampton. Villages are listed with post offices. Scale is given in miles and longitude in degrees east of Washington D.C. The map was engraved by two New York firms owned by brothers Ralph and Freeman Rawdon. Ralph’s firm (Rawdon, Clark & Co.) was based in Albany, and Freeman’s (Rawdon, Wright & Co.) in New York City. The two were merged in 1832, and became Rawdon, Wright, Hatch & Edson. The new firm expanded to multiple locations across the country and won a U.S. government contract to produce postage stamps from 1847 to 1851. In 1858, the business merged with several other engravers to form the American Banknote Company. David H. Burr (1803–1875) had a long career as a public geographer and cartographer. Born in Bridgeport, Conn., Burr moved to upstate New York in 1822 and studied law. There, he joined the state militia and served as an aide-de-camp to Governor De Witt Clinton, where he received a surveying commission along the Erie Canal under Surveyor General Simeon De Witt. Burr had no prior training in surveying. Around 1827, Burr received support from Governor Clinton to produce his Atlas of the State of New York, which was published in 1830 (with maps dated 1829). Following the success of this publication, Burr went on to issue many other maps of New York, the United States, and the world. He published the New Universal Atlas of the World in 1835 and—following his appointment as Topographer to the U.S. Post Office—the Postal Atlas of the United States in 1839. Burr held several important positions in the federal government, including Geographer to the House of Representatives, and later Geographer to the Senate. He was appointed to multiple terms as Surveyor General in various U.S. states and territories, beginning with Florida in 1848, followed by Louisiana in 1850, and Utah in 1855. He retired in 1857. REFERENCES: Ristow, Walter. American Maps and Mapmakers (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1985), pp. 103–105; “Rawdon, Wright, Hatch & Edson (1847-1851)” at Smithsonian National Postal Museum online.
Item #9222
Price: $3,500.00
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