$70.00 CAD
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Map printed in 1894 by The Royal Geographic Society (London UK), illustrating Canadian geologist A. P. Coleman's 1893 expedition to explore Mount Brown and the headwaters of the Athabasca River in the Canadian Rockies.
Titled:
Map showing
Mr. Coleman’s Route to
Mt BROWN & THE SOURCES OF THE ATHABASCA RIVER
In the Rocky Mountains
1893
Published by the Royal Geographical Society
The Geographical Journal 1894
Turner & Shawe, 43 Brewer Street, Golden SQ. W.
Folded, as issued.
67 x 23 cm
Famous exploration map by Arthur Philemon Coleman (1852-1939), a Canadian geologist, mountaineer, and professor at the University of Toronto.
The map illustrates A. P. Coleman's 1893 expedition to explore Mount Brown and the headwaters of the Athabasca River in the Canadian Rockies. The map was published in connection with his paper Mount Brown and the Sources of the Athabasca, which appeared in the 1890s and was later reproduced by the Royal Geographical Society.
In the nineteenth century, Mount Brown and nearby Mount Hooker were believed to be among the highest mountains in North America, with published elevations approaching 16,000 feet. Coleman undertook his expedition partly to investigate these claims.
His 1893 journey reached and climbed Mount Brown and examined the Athabasca headwaters.
Later surveys demonstrated that Mount Brown was much lower than the legendary elevations shown on early maps, making the mountain an interesting example of nineteenth-century cartographic error. This specific point is discussed in Coleman's paper, which notes the extraordinarily high elevations then attributed to Mount Brown and Mount Hooker.
