Gold Coast Atlas

Summary

This article reviews two significant additions to the Map Division's collections at the Library of Congress. The first is the 5th edition of the Gold Coast Atlas (1949), published by the Gold Coast Survey Department, containing twenty maps covering administrative areas, population, tribal distribution, languages, physical features, geology, mineral deposits, rainfall, forestry, agricultural products, cattle routes, and railways, along with a gazetteer listing 1,083 towns, 161 rivers, and 62 hills. However, it lacks supplementary textual material and maps on tropical diseases. The second comprises relief maps by Karl Wenschow, a leading postwar German cartographer, including sheets of German states, Europe, and the Americas at scales from 1:750,000 to 1:7,500,000, depicting topography, boundaries, railroads, highways, canals, and oil pipelines.