General road maps go all the way back to the first United States road maps produced by Christopher Colles in 1789. In the early years of the automobile there were many different publishers such as Mendenhall, White, Automobile Blue Book, and others. In the 1920's major publishers like Rand McNally took over, oil companies and state highway departments began handing out free maps, and the small publishers of road maps either printed other things or went out of business. General road maps, usually forgotten about today, continued to be issued and are shown here although the pickings are slim from the 40's to the 80's. AAA continued to distribute road maps to members and many are included here to fill in the years. After oil companies stopped handing out free maps in the 1980's, the general road map business picked up again and several new publishers entered the field.

The road map images are divided by decade and accessed using the links below. There is an image for almost every year from 1890 to 2000. For some folded maps, in addition to the cover image link, there is a map image link to show the cartography features. Thus, both changes in map illustration and cartography over the years can be seen. Some early maps from the 1890's are included here to show the beginnings of automobile road maps.

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Copyright 2000-2008 by Harold Cramer. All rights reserved.
Last revised: March 30, 2007.