Great Smoky Mountains Topographic Map, 1934

The story of this map

Great Smoky Mountains National Park was established in 1934, and this is the US Geological Survey’s map of it from that same year: the park as it was first drawn, on two sheets that we join into one long panorama of the highest mountains in the eastern United States.

Contour maps love the Smokies. The main crest runs across the middle of the sheet as a spine of tightly packed brown lines, with Clingmans Dome, Newfound Gap and Mount Le Conte standing out as knots of concentric contours. Cades Cove opens as a flat oval of open ground on the Tennessee side, and the creeks and coves fall away in every direction toward Gatlinburg, Cherokee and the foothills. The Appalachian Trail follows the ridge along the state line.

For anyone who has hiked, camped or grown up in these mountains the map is full of familiar names, and its plain government lettering gives it the honest feel of a trail map pinned up in a ranger station. It rewards a long look.

We print it as a restored reproduction in our Framed Topographic Maps collection. It suits a cabin in the foothills, a family room, or a wall of national park prints. Printed to order on archival matte paper and framed in the country of delivery.

Before and after

Left: the archive scan exactly as published. Right: the file that goes to the printer.

Archive scanRestored

Restoration notes

Restoration plan: the map was issued on two sheets (east and west) which must be stitched into one image with the join matched and blended; then crop scan margins, balance colour cast and levels while keeping the paper tone, remove library stamps and scanner artefacts if present, gentle sharpening. No repainting of original content.

Every print carries its archive credit on the packing slip. Paper tone and small imperfections of the original are kept on purpose; nothing is redrawn.