Every Lake
New York
A great triangle hinged on the Hudson, with an Adirondack wilderness bigger than most states inside it.
New York in relief
The land itself, cut in six steps of birch from the lowlands to the high ground — the cities starred, the summit and rise on the title block. No counties, no roads: just the shape of New York.
About New York
New York's shape comes from water and treaty. The Hudson runs straight up the eastern side from the harbor, Lake Champlain finishes that line to Canada, Lakes Erie and Ontario and the St. Lawrence draw the north and west, and Long Island reaches a hundred miles into the Atlantic. In the middle sit the Adirondacks — a six-million-acre park, the largest protected area in the lower 48 — with the Catskills south of the Mohawk and the eleven Finger Lakes raked into the land by the ice. Sixty-two counties run from tiny Manhattan blocks to townships bigger than Rhode Island.
New York ratified on July 26, 1788, eleventh of the thirteen, by three votes. Albany, a Dutch trading post on the Hudson, became the permanent capital in 1797, upriver and safe. The map's great line is the Mohawk corridor: the Erie Canal opened in 1825 through the only water-level gap in the Appalachians, the New York Central followed it, and the Thruway follows both. I-87 runs the Hudson north to the border, and the whole state still tilts toward that one seam.
- Six layers of birch — the land in elevation steps
- The summit and total rise on the title block
- The major cities, starred and named
- Title block with the admission date and capital
- A double rule engraved around the edge
- Every county line and the state border
- The interstates with their shields — 14 on this board
- The major cities, starred and named
- Title block with the admission date and capital
- A mile ruler engraved around the frame
