Souvenir Historical Map Jamestown 350th Anniversary Festival 1607-1957 Virginia

A cartographic souvenir from the Jamestown 350th Anniversary Festival.

The Jamestown 350th Anniversary was an eight-month long event held in 1957 celebrating Virginia’s cultural and historic heritage as the home of the oldest English colony in North America. The festival drew thousands of attendees (including Queen Elizabeth II) to historical sites like Jamestown, Colonial Williamsburg, and Yorktown.

This map was sold as a souvenir at the event, and is allegedly ‘based on the original 17th century map of Captain John Smith and on Engravings for his Writings.’ As might be expected, then, the image presents an Anglo-centric historical perspective that largely overlooks the invaluable contributions of the indigenous populations. (Note that Native American villages are labeled as ‘headquarters of savage kyngs).

Ten different vignettes focusing on the adventures of Captain John Smith are numbered throughout the map, accompanied by brief captions that provide little historical context. The map was illustrated by J. Lindsey Ocheltree and lithographed in Norfolk, Virginia by the Liksey Lithograph Company. Scarce, with only three entries in WorldCat (two at the University of Virginia, one in Virginia Beach) and not in Rumsey.

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