Hello Albion:
For my doctoral thesis, I need to find some electronic maps of
Great Britain that I can manipulate and paste into my text.
My requirements (and hopes) are:
1. Simple outline maps of the island of Great Britain. No geographical
extras such as rivers or mountains.
2. If possible, maps that include 19th century county borders.
3. If the major towns and cities are included, so much the better
but I can put them in myself.
Basically what I'm trying to do is show the extent to which there
was a liberal party organisation operating from London and radiating
out into the country. In my archival research I've been coming up with
some very interesting (and potentially contentious, as far as it goes)
evidence to show that the communication between agents in the provinces
and the central agent and party whip in London was quite extensive
temporally and geographically. So, I want to be able to shade in
the areas where there was extensive communication (and funding coming
from London), and show how those changed/spread from 1832-1860.
This will require maps that I can work with extensively on either
a graphics program, etc.
I'm also interested in methodological advice on how to do this.
Is there a computer program out there that'll take in my information
raw (more or less) and produce nifty-keen maps at the touch of
a button. What I mean is, if there's something out there that can
make this easier, a "smart" program that knows pre-1974 county
borders etc, I'd love to hear about it.
-Joe Coohill