North America through the eyes of its explorers

By Steven Martinovich
web posted January 10, 2005

Outside of the ocean floor, 85 per cent of which has not yet been visited by man, there are no empty spots on a map of the Earth. At one time, of course, that was not the case. As little as a century and a half-ago most of the western United States and Canada's far north were vast white spaces on maps. It took centuries for explorers to answer the most basic questions about North America, what's there and where is it?

Derek Hayes' America Discovered: A Historical Atlas of Exploration is a fascinating look at the evolution of North America -- defined in this book as Canada and the United States -- as seen through the eyes of European explorers and mapmakers. He does this by utilizing approximately 300 maps created over the past five centuries during the exploration of North America. It is a stunning collection that shows mapmaking not simply as the utilitarian necessity that it was, but also an art form. Given some of the flights of fancy that mapmakers indulged in when filling those empty spaces or the assumptions of explorers, some maps were more art then reality.

America Discovered unveils those maps and Hayes' insightful commentary in basically a chronological manner. He opens with early Viking exploration of North America, and the few maps we have from that period, before moving onto Christopher Columbus -- who technically didn't reach North America itself, but rather islands off the continent. As he illustrates, the next centuries saw a slow process exploring to determine how big the continent was, if there an easy route across it, and what resources could be exploited.

Although many of have a romantic view of these early explorers, Hayes makes it very clear that nearly all exploration was a result of the profit motive. Native Americans were either used or eliminated in that quest. Explorers were interested in know what was over the next hill in the hopes of being able to sell it back in Europe or somehow make money from settlers.

"The line between explorer and trader, adventurer and goldseeker is often somewhat blurred. But men had to have motivation for their explorations; although the desire to know what was over the next hill, beyond the next mountain range, or farther up the river was a motivator in a local sense, it was the desire to find wealth, expand trade, and find new routes for commerce that initiated their explorations, and drew others to invest in their venture in the hope of a return for their speculation. Without that investment, little exploration would have occurred."

As Hayes chronicles, the maps produced often reflected the desires of the explorers, not reality. After it was realized that North America wasn't Asia, explorers searched for a route through to China. Rivers, bays and straits not fully explored were reported back in Europe as paths across the continent. Those searching for riches placed non-existent cities of gold and silver on their maps. Exploration often produced many new myths -- such as the belief that California was an island, one that persisted for nearly two centuries -- as were dispelled. Complicating matters was the fact that some nations hide their maps from the world, causing a few explorers to repeatedly "discover" of some parts of North America.

Although the maps are the stars of this book, it is also a well-written effort. Hayes' training as a geographer and the four previous historical atlases he has authored have prepared him well for America Discovered. While he concentrates his chronicle on the better-known explorers and mapmakers, he doesn't ignore those names unfamiliar to most of us, such as Arctic explorer John Franklin, mapmaker John Barnwell and fur trader Peter Pond, and their unique stories. American Discovered is meant as an introduction but a reader will come away with a wealth of knowledge.

If its purpose were limited to simply being an attractive coffee table book, America Discovered would count as a marvelous success. It achieves, however, more then that. It is an insightful book that traces the evolution of North America and what its explorers desired of it as it was gradually revealed through the centuries, both through its maps and Hayes' illuminating commentary. America Discovered is a wonderful introduction for those interested in learning how humanity filled in those mysterious white spaces where two nations were eventually born.

Steven Martinovich is a freelance writer in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada.

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