Map of Maine drawn by Sarah N. Young, 1822

Contributed by Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education

Description

Pen and ink map of Maine by Sarah N. Young, a student at Cony Female Academy. Highlights boundary lines, rivers and lakes in unsurveyed parts of Maine. Sarah Young’s large map of the state of Maine was based on the work of mapmaker Moses Greenleaf, and resembles his 1816 map of the District of Maine, as well as his later map of the State of Maine from 1820. This Maine map exercise, completed in the early years of Maine’s statehood, exemplifies a local focus that became much more common in geographic education by the mid-nineteenth century. Young’s careful rendering of Greenleaf’s work depicts the steady hand and careful attention to detail needed in map drawing. As you can see in her elaborate rendering of the title, map drawing also served as an exercise in practicing penmanship.

Cony Female Academy in Augusta was founded by Daniel Cony in 1816 providing free education to orphans and other girls under the age of 16. The school was later expanded into a co-ed high school. According to an 1828 Augusta newspaper advertisement, Cony’s curriculum offered instruction in: “orthography, reading and writing, arithmetic, grammar, rhetoric and composition, geography, History and Chronology, Natural History, Natural Philosophy and Astronomy, use of the globes, Drawing Maps, and also Drawing, penciling, and painting, and a variety of needlework.”

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About This Item

  • Title: Map of Maine drawn by Sarah N. Young, 1822
  • Creator: Sarah N. Young
  • Creation Date: 1822
  • Subject Date: 1822
  • Location: ME
  • Media: Ink on Paper
  • Dimensions: 103 cm x 66 cm
  • Local Code: 53525 (OML-1822-29)
  • Collection: Osher Map Library Sheet Map Collection
  • Object Type: Image

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For more information about this item, contact:

Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education
University of Southern Maine, Glickman Library, PO Box 9300, Portland, ME 04014
(207) 780-4850
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Use of this Item is not restricted by copyright and/or related rights, but the holding organization is contractually obligated to limit use. For more information, please contact the contributing organization. However, watermarked Maine Memory Network images may be used for educational purposes.

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