Strange Maps

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A vintage map illustration showing the Arctic region, including parts of northern Europe, Greenland, and surrounding seas, with radial lines converging at the North Pole.
White text on a light grey background reads "Strange Maps" in a large, serif font.
The world, seen sideways.

Most maps show the world as something to be navigated. Strange Maps reveals the worlds humans have imagined.

Since 2006, Frank Jacobs has been collecting and interpreting maps that do more than chart geography or political borders. These maps — often obscure, beautiful, funny, and deeply revealing — each tell a story, usually one that’s more about how we see ourselves than where we are.

Published as a book in 2009 and a Big Think column since 2010, Strange Maps draws on a steady stream of reader submissions and rare discoveries. Together, they offer a way of seeing the world from unfamiliar angles, where cartography becomes culture, argument, and art.

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Frank Jacobs is a journalist whose work explores how culture, history, and imagination shape the way we see the world.

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strange maps
Memorizing London’s 25,000 streets changes cabbies’ brains — and may prevent Alzheimer’s
One of the toughest vocational exams in the world requires candidates to memorize 25,000 streets in an area five times the size of Manhattan.

by Frank Jacobs

A person stands next to a large book titled "The Knowledge," symbolizing mastery of the city’s map.
Everything Articles
World map illustrating various countries color-coded by their happiness levels with symbols indicating the most and least happy countries in each region.
Strange Maps
Mapped: The highs and lows of the world’s happiness landscape
The Gallup World Poll reveals regional peaks and valleys of happiness across all of the continents.
Frank Jacobs
A graphical representation of network connections superimposed on a dark map, highlighting major nodes with bright orange and yellow lines.
Strange Maps
The Enlightenment had its own internet: The Republic of Letters
Digital analyses of Enlightenment-era letters are teaching us a thing or two about Locke, Voltaire, and others.
Frank Jacobs
A composite image of the milky way galaxy showing colorful interstellar dust and gas with star fields.
Strange Maps
New map reveals the Milky Way’s magnetic heart
This first-of-its-kind image offers a detailed look at the magnetic fields within the Central Molecular Zone.
Frank Jacobs
Do you live in a new desert?.
Strange Maps
America’s news deserts are growing
Most counties in the U.S. have only one local newspaper, often one that publishes weekly instead of daily.
Frank Jacobs
Map of the united states indicating earthquake epicenters and areas where people reported feeling at least weak shaking, highlighting a magnitude 6.0 earthquake in central california on september 28, 2004, and a magnitude 5.8 earthquake in central virginia on august 23, 2011.
Strange Maps
East Coast quakes are felt farther than West Coast ones. Here’s why.
Across the subterranean United States, not all rocks were created equally.
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
Dewey Decimal: The sorting system that revolutionized libraries
This map samples some of the digits that make up the DDC system, invented by the brilliant but flawed Melvil Dewey.
Frank Jacobs
Historical map illustration depicting a planned city layout with a circular central area and radiating streets.
Strange Maps
Ohio’s Circleville ditched the grid system. Then it got squared.
A small Ohio town tried to escape America’s addiction to rectangular grids. It didn’t last long.
Frank Jacobs
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