DAN MILLER

01 MAPPING HISTORICAL NEW YORK

2018-CURRENT

I currently lead data analysis and design work on the Mapping Historical New York Project, a collaboration between Columbia University GSAPP’s Center for Spatial Research and Department of History. Through intensive digitization of historical maps and censuses, the project seeks to reconstruct the demographic and structural changes of New York City between 1850 and 1940.

As project lead, I work with scholars and students from across the university to develop computational methods for processing, analyzing, and visualizing historical census records. Our work so far has resulted in mapping over 14 million unique census records for 1850, 1880, 1910, and 1940 to historical home locations in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, and the Bronx. I also guide the design and development of the project website, or Digital Atlas, which launched in October 2021. Drawing on the census data we’ve generated, the Digital Atlas shows how migration, residential, and occupational patterns shaped the city and is a tool for researchers and students of NYC history.

Creating critical infrastructure for digital, historical research:

Mapping Historical New York is a hub for dozens of archival maps and atlases, which we have digitized and curated into a Digital Atlas website for public use. From these historical maps, we have carefully developed spatial data that charts changes in the city's built environment across 100 years: from rural roads to urban grid systems, from salt marshes to industrial waterfronts, from rowhouses, to tenements, to apartment blocks. Alongside the digitization of thousands of historical streets, we map many millions of census records, down to the scale of the individual dwelling for each census year, which provide unprecedented resolution for carrying out research on the city's dynamic population, block by block, building by building.

To work with these big data, Mapping Historical New York integrates techniques from data science, web design and development, and data visualization together alongside critical questions in urban history and the humanities.

Each building on the Digital Atlas is represented by a cluster of points, which show a user how the census counted the people who lived there: gender, age, birthplace, race, and occupation are not static and straightforward categories but can be explored over time using the project's website.

The project’s Digital Atlas was awarded Best Digital / Interactive Map and Best in Show (tied) from the 49th Annual Map Design Competition of the Cartographic and Geographic Information Society (CaGIS).

Collaborators:

Tools:
Link:

Columbia’s Center for Spatial Research and Department of History; Stamen Design
ArcGIS, QGIS, Python, R, HTML, CSS, JavaScript
www.mappinghny.com

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