Google Earth Historical Maps

Maps are amazing. Maps were one of the first way to visualized data. I (Michael K) spent many hours studying an atlas when I was little. Street maps, public transport maps and Autobahn maps fascinated me. And of course when Google Maps came around, I was hooked too. Early in the WWHS Museum we did work together with Eric Becker from the GIS Department of the City of Westfield (I think it was still the Town of Westfield when we got started), who did a lot of the painstaking work matching up the names and the properties with modern data. During some computer moves/changes/breakdowns that data unfortunately got lost.  I always regretted that, especially as my day job is in IT. And because Eric Becker passed away from illness way to young. (Obituary)

I also was always fascinated by Google Earth, the professional version of Google Map and recently had another look at it. Partially because of a map of Indian Mounds I found when visiting Marietta, Ohio that was entirely housed on Google Maps and their website. So I wanted to explore that more.

When following the link below you get to explore the maps posted (currently Hamilton County Washington Township 1866, Westfield 1866, Eagletown 1866 AND a map made of memories by Paul Brown from 1880 Westfield). Sometimes it is a bit hard to see the original old map in the background. Switching back and forth between Satellite map and Street map sometimes helps. Zooming in and out does too. Try it out and please give us feedback how you like it.

This map couldn't have been done, at least not nearly as quickly, without the help of Brendan White you did the majority of the tagging of the properties! Thank you so much for that! We are planning to add information to each property, as it becomes available, we have time, linking to our website for larger entries. If you are interested in working on this, or provide the history of one of the properties you have available because your family owned it for a long time, please contact us!

Michael Kobrowski

Brendan White