This is a collection of historic maps and birds eye images of Washington DC during the late 1800s and early 1900s. The collection includes 58 highly-detailed topographic maps that appear to have been completed in the 1870s and 1880s of the outlying areas of Washington DC. These were a bit tricky to georeference, but they turned out to be amazingly accurate given the time period in which they were originally surveyed. The topographic maps show the locations of buildings, military installations, horse race tracks, etc, as well as general land use.
The birds eye images have been placed in the approximate location of the original artist’s perspective. These are very high resolution images so go ahead and zoom in to see all the detail.
All of the maps and images are about 3-5 megabytes and may take a minute or two to load. The following maps/images are included.
- 58 topographic maps from the 1870s/1880s (from NOAA Historic Maps)
- 1792 plan of Washington DC (from NOAA Historic Maps)
- 1851 map of Washington DC (from David Rumsey Historic Maps)
- 1861 map of Washington DC (from David Rumsey Historic Maps)
- 1871, 1883, 1888, 1916, and 1923 Birds Eye images from various locations around Washington DC (from Library of Congress)