Department of Natural Resources Web Site Resources

Autumn in Indiana via Cyberspace

Sunday, September 23, marked the first day of autumn in Indiana, so soon the beautiful changing colors of the trees will mark the season. The Department of Natural Resources has posted a “Leaf Cam” on its Web site. The “Leaf Cam” shoots still photographs of various forested sites around Indiana and refreshes every 15 minutes. Viewers can watch for the peak color changes of fall in the coming weeks. The locations of the cameras are Hilltop Cabins in Brown County, Conner Prairie in Noblesville, French Lick Resort, The Fort Golf Course in Lawrence, Lafayette Municipal Golf Course, and Spring Mill State Park.

The Web site is cosponsored by the Indiana Office of Tourism Development and also features an interactive travel guide, listing campgrounds, festivals, restaurants, contests, and other information. Interactive maps of Indiana are also available on the site.

The main Web site is located at http://www.in.gov/visitindiana/ and the “Leaf Cam” is located at http://www.in.gov/visitindiana/leafcam/

Maps in the News: Iran

Maps in the News: Iran

The visit of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to the United Nations and Columbia University in New York this week once again placed Iran in the world news headlines. The Geospatial Resources & Map Collection is an excellent source for maps and atlases featuring countries all over the world, and the Collection includes a wide variety of maps of Iran.

One of the newest maps of Iran in the Map Collection is the Iran Country Profile created by the United States Central Intelligence Agency. This map features a large map of the country with inset maps showing regional physiography, ethnoreligious distribution, population density, key petroleum sector facilities, energy prospects, and a comparative map. The comparative map displays Iran stretching from South Dakota over to Michigan and down to Georgia as an overlay of a map of the United States.

Another map, Tourist Guide to Iran and Tehran, features popular attractions in the country and its capital city. The map gives information about the topography, the seas, the flora and fauna, government, climate, and population and cultural features. The map of Tehran (above) shows the locations of museums, schools, palaces, and other attractions. Images on the map (above) show amusement parks and sports stadiums.

Other geographic resources about Iran in the Collection include a map of mineral deposits in the country, a natural vegetation map, a map about a festival in Guilan Province, and maps of Abadan, Qum, Yazd, and other cities and provinces in Iran. Atlas d’Iran, Atlas of Iran White Revolution, and A Historical Atlas of Iran are also available in the Atlas Collection.

Maps from the GRMC check out for two weeks, and atlases check out for 28 days.

Contact the GRMC for more information about resources on Iran for research and learning.

New York Photo Atlas Available from University Libraries

Aerial Images of New York in the Atlas Collection

Tuesday marks the sixth anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks on the United States. This aerial image of lower Manhattan shows the former site of the World Trade Center as it appeared in 2004. This aerial photograph is taken from New York: The Photo Atlas: An Aerial Tour of All Five Boroughs and More, which is available for checkout from the University Libraries Atlas Collection.

The Atlas Collection is located on the east side of the second floor of Bracken Library. The staff of the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection can help locate any atlases needed for research and learning. Atlases check out for four weeks.

Top Ten Reasons to Visit the GRMC

In honor of the David Letterman dedication ceremony at Ball State University on September 7...

September 2007 Map Display

September 2007 Map of the Month

The “Map of the Month” for September in the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection is called Che’s Route: Ernesto Guevara’s Trip across South America. The map marks the travels of political figure and revolutionary Ernesto Guevara, more commonly known as “Che.” The map traces the route of Guevara’s 1952 motorcycle trip across the continent, and includes descriptions of every major stop in Argentina, Peru, Chile’, Colombia, Venezuela, and Bolivia.

September 15 is the beginning of Hispanic Heritage Month, which marks the independence of five Latin American countries. Many believe that Guevara was responsible for the revolutions for independence of many of these countries.

Visit the GRMC for more information about this map or any other geographic resources.

August 2007 Events in the GRMC

What's Happening in the GRMC? August 2007 Edition

August is the time for back-to-school at Ball State University, and classes have already begun visiting the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection for instructional sessions and various research projects.

Elizabeth Nesbitt, an instructor for the Writing Program in the Department of English, brought three sections of her English 102 and 104 classes into the GRMC for customized instructional sessions during the month of August. Students were given an assignment using maps for rhetorical analysis. Students viewed maps of the same place from two different perspectives and maps created from an unusual point of view. Students learned about the visual information provided by how maps are created and how various topics are represented on maps. Students then chose five maps of different topics and learned how to cite the maps and atlases.

Students in Marketing & Management 300 also learned about the resources of the GRMC in their classroom. Digital national base and census data and GIS applications were presented to enhance a class project in coordination with Vera Bradley Retail Stores, Inc. Students in Natural Resources & Environmental Management also learned about GIS resources available in the University Libraries.

Geography and Political Science students will be using maps from the GRMC in their classroom for special research projects throughout the fall semester. Many other students have already begun using the GRMC for their research and learning. Students from anthropology, geology, social studies, and the College of Architecture & Planning visited the GRMC during the month of August. Even an instructor for a cooking seminar used maps from the GRMC for an upcoming lesson.

The Geospatial Resources & Map Collection is a great destination for research and learning. Contact the staff for more information about customized instructional sessions in the GRMC.

GRMC Holiday Hours

Geospatial Resources & Map Collection Holiday Hours

The Geospatial Resources & Map Collection will be closed for Labor Day on Monday, September 3. The GRMC will reopen at 8:00 A.M. on Tuesday, September 4.

Electronic Resources Available in GRMC

More than Maps in the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection

The Geospatial Resources & Map Collection in Bracken Library houses thousands of maps and atlases and includes a GIS lab with access to useful geographic data and the latest computer software, but other electronic resources are also available in the GRMC. The GRMC includes a collection of over 250 CD-ROM’s featuring geographic and mapping software.

National Geographic’s Back Roads Explorer 3-D is available in the GRMC. It features topographic maps with updated roads for all fifty states. Users can pan, zoom, and customize a route along one or more maps and see the animated 3-D preview. The software also allows the creation of elevation profiles and printing custom maps.

Delorme’s Topo USA is a similar mapping software that includes topographic coverage of United States. Users can search locations, view street-level detail, calculate routes, view 2-D and 3-D terrain with shaded relief and 20-foot contour intervals, and view land cover features and elevation profiles. The software includes draw and print tools for customizing and printing. The software can also be used to download maps and route directions to Palm OS handheld devices and use the Global Positioning System (GPS) through a connection with a GPS receiver.

The GRMC also includes computer software from TIGER/line featuring digital databases of geographic features. The U.S. Geological Survey published computer software featuring digital raster graphic data from various areas around the United States. A Topographic Field Trip of Washington, D.C. is another CD-ROM from the U.S.G.S. The Collection also includes weather charts from the National Imagery and Mapping Agency, Congressional District Atlases, Census tract outline maps, and Census block maps. Gap analysis GIS data for the United States is also available as an electronic resource in the GRMC.

The AniMap Plus: County Boundary Historical Atlas CD-ROM available in the GRMC displays over 2,000 maps showing all the changing county boundaries in the 48 adjacent states for every year from colonial times to the present. It also includes searchable databases containing more than 240,000 cities, towns and other populated places, over 30,000 historical sites, and 100,000 cemeteries, all of which can be plotted on the maps. This software enables users to locate historical towns which are not on current maps or which are now in a different county.

The GRMC also includes a CD-ROM of the Historic Atlas of Indiana Counties from 1876. The CD-ROM consists of high resolution digital maps in Adobe (PDF) portable document format. Each map includes the following 19th century features: roads, railroads and canals; cities, towns and villages; post offices and government sites; one-room schoolhouses, churches and cemeteries; rivers, streams and ferries; racetracks, fairgrounds and picnic groves; industrial sites, furnaces and mills; and early homesteads and farms.

Some of compact discs in the GRMC are available for use in the GIS lab, but some also circulate for two weeks. For more information about the collection of computer software in the GRMC, contact the staff Monday through Friday from 8:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M.

ESRI GIS Movie Presentation

Everyday GIS

ESRI developed a movie presentation about how GIS is a part of our lives every hour of every day. The presentation features examples of GIS maps and applications at http://www.esri.com/company/gis_touches/everyday.html

The Geospatial Resources & Map Collection features a GIS lab with dual monitors, and a GIS Specialist is available to assist with projects and data retrieval. The GRMC is open Monday through Friday from 8:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M.

GRMC an Extension of the Classroom

Back to School in the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection

Classes at Ball State University begin on Monday, August 20, and faculty members are encouraged to extend classroom learning and research to the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection. The GRMC will create an instruction session tailored to the needs of your students on such topics as finding and using maps, types of maps and their use, sources for locating geospatial data, and tools for researching geographical information.

Class assignments requiring the use of the GRMC or any part of its resources are encouraged. The GIS Specialist can show students how to use GIS and geographic data in special projects in the GIS lab. Materials from the Collection may be used in a special study area of the GRMC, and faculty may reserve maps when an entire class will be using the materials.

Lessons using specific resources from the Collection (such as Civil War maps, historical atlases, or Indiana county soil surveys) may also be coordinated with faculty classroom projects. View the presentation "Using Maps and GIS in Social Studies Lessons" created for the SS392 Social Studies Methods class, June 2007.

Orientation tours of the GRMC for school and community groups may also be arranged. Small-group presentations can also be accommodated.

Individual students may find many resources available in the GRMC. Students writing research papers may wish to borrow or scan a map or part of an atlas to add to their paper. And students presenting speeches may wish to borrow a map as a visual aid. The Collection includes many poster-type maps that cover special interest topics like environmental issues, dinosaurs of North America, endangered species, world terrorism, the Harlem Renaissance, soccer around the world, and even the route of the Titanic.

If you are a faculty member and would like to schedule a library instruction session for your class, please contact the GRMC staff. The GRMC is open Monday through Friday from 8:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M.

GIS and Football in the GRMC

GIS for Game Day: Ball State University Football Map

Football season officially begins today at Ball State University with the first practice of the year. Assistant Coach Eddie Faulkner greets his running backs each season with a large poster showing where the players live. The GIS Specialist in the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection Angela Gibson created this map for Coach Faulkner using GIS software. The map was then printed on the large-format plotter in the GRMC for display in the football office.

Contact the GRMC to inquire about the creation of custom GIS maps for special research projects or to print a poster on the large-format plotter. Charges for printing are sent directly to the Bursar’s office.

Topographic Maps from around the World in GRMC

Topographic Maps from Around the World Available in GRMC

The U.S. Geological Survey topographic quadrangle maps are popular items in the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection, but what if someone needs a topographic map of Iceland for research or learning? The GRMC has that, too! There are actually five different sets of topographic maps of Iceland created at different scales in the Collection. In fact the GRMC has individual topographic maps from over fifty countries around the world, including Brazil, Guyana, Poland (shown), Brunei, Mongolia, Madagascar, Senegal, and Pacific Island countries.

World and regional topographic map sets cover literally the rest of the world. World topographic maps are available in many different scales. Regional topographic maps cover areas of different countries. These topographic maps cover regions of South America, Europe, Asia, and Africa. And topographic maps of Antarctica are even available from the Collection.

Topographic maps are important tools in geographic research because they are created using contour lines, showing areas of equal elevation. These maps make it possible to measure the terrain of the countryside or the height of mountains. Architecture students find the maps useful for site planning.

All the maps in the GRMC circulate for two weeks. Please note that not all of the topographic maps are cataloged in the library CardCat system, so contact or visit the GRMC to find out what types of maps are available for specific areas around the world.

The GRMC is open during the summer Monday through Friday from 7:30 A.M. to 4:30 P.M. and during the academic year from 8:00 A.M. through 5:00 P.M.

Indiana Higher Education Map Display

Happy Meals, Heismans, and Higher Education:
Indiana Back-to-School Facts Map Display


A special “back-to-school” map display for August was created by the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection student-assistant Amanda Hunt. Amanda’s actual work-home at University Libraries is in the Archives & Special Collections, but she is also working in the GRMC for the summer.

Amanda is a junior from Vincennes, Indiana, where she graduated from Vincennes Lincoln High School. Majoring in history with a French minor, Amanda plans to attend graduate school for library science and/or history in order to become an archivist. Her dream job would be working as an archivist at a large or medium-size museum.

Amanda compiled a list of interesting facts about some of the colleges and universities in Indiana in order to create this map of “fun facts.” Some surprising facts on the map: Manchester College is the home of the first peace studies program in the United States; the President of Starbucks attended DePauw University; Notre Dame produced seven Heisman Trophy winners; and Carter’s Hot Dogs in Ball State’s Village was voted #51 on the Sports Illustrated “On-Campus Top 100 Things You Must Do before You Graduate.”

Visit the east side of the second floor of Bracken Library to view this and other map displays.

Ball State University Campus Maps Display

Ball State University Campus Maps through the Ages

The map featured is a campus map of Ball State University from 1929. The school had just received its new name Ball State Teachers College during that year. This map is one of the maps featured in the “Map of the Month” display in the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection on the second floor of Bracken Library. This special “back-to-school” display features maps dating from 1928 to 1996. The changes in the landscape of the campus from the beginning and since 1996 are striking.

Contact the GRMC for more information about these historic maps of Ball State University.

Recreational Maps Artwork Display

Summer Fun Displayed on Recreation Maps

Click to view the special summer map display featuring artwork from recreational maps in the Geospatial Resources & Map Collection.

New Orleans Map Acquisitions in the GRMC

New Materials in the GRMC for Hurricane Katrina Research

August marks the two-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. The hurricane formed on August 23, 2005, and devastated the Gulf Coast and New Orleans by August 29. Hurricane Katrina was the costliest and one of the deadliest hurricanes ever in recorded history.

The Geospatial Resources & Map Collection has added two maps related to Hurricane Katrina to the Collection. The U.S. Geological Survey created a map showing the water depth of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. The map was produced using remote sensing data. According to the map vendor Terra Prints, “Because an accurate delineation of the flooded area was not yet available, the flood water level within the city was derived from a lake level gage on Lake Pontchartrain, with the assumption that the level of the lake and the floodwaters had equalized by Friday, September 2, 2005.”

The second map is a satellite wall map of New Orleans, Louisiana (shown above). This map of New Orleans was acquired via satellite in 2000 prior to the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. Lake Pontchartrain borders the city to the north, and the Mississippi River winds its way through the image.

Both of the maps will be available for checkout in the GRMC. Be sure to check the map exhibit of Historic Hurricanes displayed in the front window of the GRMC on the second floor of Bracken Library.

Scanner Available in the GRMC

Scanning in the GRMC

The Geospatial Resources & Map Collection offers a scanner for use digitizing maps and atlases from the Collection. This service is especially convenient for use with reference atlases and maps. Maps from the Collection could be included in papers and presentations in digital format. (The GRMC also offers information on how to cite maps, atlases, and other cartographic resources).

The UMAX Power Look 2100 XL scans images up to 12 ½ x 17 ½ inches. The staff of the GRMC will scan the maps and save the images at the requested resolution. The digital images may be saved to a disc or iLocker account.

Contact the GRMC during regular business hours Monday through Friday for more information.

New Materials in the GRMC

New Materials in the GRMC

The University Libraries Geospatial Resources & Map Collection and the Atlas Collection have recently added new materials to the collections.

Atlases of Canada and Costa Rica have been added to the Atlas Collection, along with the Historical Atlas of the Napoleonic Era, Penguin Historical Atlas of the British Empire, and the Atlas of Global Development.

New maps of Indiana cities have been added to the Map Collection. New editions of maps of Carmel, Evansville, South Bend, Fort Wayne, and Muncie were recently acquired. Also a new Cancun travel guide map was added to the Collection, along with Three Centuries of Earthquakes: Earthquakes in the Central United States, 1699-2002. New maps were also acquired from the National Geographic Society: North America in the Age of Dinosaurs, Germany, and a map of the West Indies. A colorful map of Crater Lake in Oregon has also been added to the Collection.

Maps from the GRMC can be checked out for two weeks, and atlases can be checked out for four weeks.

GRMC Displays for July

In the Window: July 2007 GRMC Map Displays


The “Map of the Month” for July 2007 celebrates the birth of the nation. The map featured is of the Ohio Valley. This map is one of seventeen in a series created by National Geographic called The Making of America. These maps feature different regions of the United States and describe the history and geography of the area.

A world map in the window reveals the winners of the newly-elected New Seven Wonders of the World.

A special movie-related map display is also presented to commemorate two July premieres. A map featuring The Simpsons’ Springfield is shown with other Springfields across the United States competing to host The Simpsons Movie premiere. Another map shows places connected to Harry Potter in the United Kingdom.

A map of the United Kingdom is featured with a street map of Baghdad in the Maps in the News display of the GRMC due to the recent terrorist attacks. Also a GoogleEarth image of Wembley Stadium in London, England, shows the location of “The Concert for Diana” that was held on July 1 and the "Live Earth" concert on July 7. This image was printed using the large-format plotter. Prices for printing on the plotter are $8.00 for 36 inches and under, $10.00 for items 37-72 inches in length, and $12.00 for items larger than 72 inches.

Please visit the GRMC to see these map displays or to use the plotter for printing.

Geospatial Resources & Map Collection Special Hours

The Geospatial Resources & Map Collection will be closed for Independence Day, Wednesday, July 4. The GRMC will reopen at 7:30 A.M. Thursday, July 5.