Chickasaw map wins geography award

Chickasaw Nation Wins People’s Choice Award at Olympics of Mapmaking EventCombining old world style map design—hand-drawn images that tell a story about the data on the map—with new technology led the Chickasaw Nation’s GeoSpatial Information Department to a People’s Choice award at what was described by a member of the team as the Olympics of geography and cartography.

The award was presented in July at the Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) International User Conference where more than 15,000 attended representing 130 countries.

“That award represented every map in every category for the people who attended to vote on,” John Ellis, director of GeoSpatial Information said in a release. “It really was like our Olympics for the geography and cartography world. These are the top geographers and cartographers in the country, so it was an honor.”

He said the map, titled “The Historic Map of the Unconquered and Unconquerable Chickasaw People,” was so popular he spent most of his free time at the event answering questions, passing out brochures about the map and talking to other map professionals about it.Comment:  For more on Indians and maps, see Google Maps in Cherokee and "Mapping America" Excludes Indians.