County Map of the State of California

Cartographer: Samuel Augustus Mitchell Jr.; issued in Mitchell’s New General Atlas, Philadelphia, circa 1873

Year: 1870

Typical of Mitchell’s post-Civil-War atlases, this hand-colored sheet outlines every California county in contrasting pastels and shades township grids where U.S. land surveys were complete. Railroads—completed and projected—thread the Sacramento and San Joaquin Valleys and climb the Sierra to meet the Central Pacific at Reno, while wagon roads and overland mail routes lace the deserts and coast. Mountain relief is rendered with fine hachures, and the state’s river drainage is carefully engraved for emigrant reference. A large inset fills the northeastern corner with a numbered ward map of San Francisco’s street grid, and a second inset at lower left details ferry routes and rail lines around San Francisco Bay. Mitchell’s trademark grape-vine border frames the composition, turning a practical land guide into an elegant atlas plate.