Lucas, Fielding Jr. “Eastern Hemisphere.”

Fielding Lucas, Jr.  “Eastern Hemisphere.”  From A New and Elegant General Atlas Containing Maps of each of the United States.   

Baltimore: F. Lucas, Jr., 1816.  9 ½ x 9 ½ (platemark).  Engraving.  Full original hand color.  Very minor staining in margins.  Else, very good condition.    

A fine map by Baltimore cartographer, Fielding Lucas, Jr. (1781- 1854).  Lucas appears to have become involved in the publishing and book trade while a resident of Philadelphia from 1798 to 1804, when he moved to Baltimore.  In 1807 Lucas joined Conrad, Lucas & Co., and then in 1810 he set up his own business at 138 Market Street.  There Lucas first got involved in cartographic publishing with his New and Elegant General Atlas of 1816.  In the second decade of the nineteenth century, through his Philadelphia contacts, Lucas was one of the major contributors to Carey & Lea’s atlas of 1823.  Concurrently with this involvement, Lucas brought out his own General Atlas, containing 104 maps of all parts of the world.  Lucas, during his 50 years of residence in Baltimore, established himself as a prominent citizen of that city, serving as President of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, President of the Board of School Commissioners, and as President of the Second Branch of the City Council.  But it is for his important role in early American cartography that Lucas is best remembered.