1. Land of Make Believe
Jaro Hess, 1930
Courtesy of the Collection of Stephen Hornsby
Jaro Hess, born in Austria in 1889, emigrated to Michigan in 1910, where he built a career as a landscape architect and painter (and dabbler in parapsychology). This rare first edition of his Land of Make Believe poster, one of the most famous American fantasy maps, illustrates more than forty fairy tales and nursery rhymes, including Little Bo-Peep, Humpty-Dumpty, and Jack the Giant Killer. In a nod to American viewers, the map includes Rip Van Winkle and The Emerald City of Oz.
With its bright colors, complex design, deep perspective, and imaginative touches (note the compass rose with “West of Moon” and “East of Sun”), the Land of Make Believe continues to challenge and inspire viewers. Simpsons creator Matt Groenig cited the map as an inspiration for the medieval fantasy kingdom of Dreamland in his recent TV series Disenchantment. Hess’s map has been in print as a popular poster since the 1930s.
2. Story Land
American Map Company, 1961
www.oshermaps.org/map/56523
Designed by M. Frederic and published by the American Map Company in 1961, this large-format decorative pictorial map of “Story Land” brings together familiar characters from fairy tales, folktales, nursery rhymes and songs, all rendered and printed in the psychedelic colors of the 1960s. Like so many of the maps in this exhibition, viewers are intended to “travel” and “explore” the map by following well-marked pathways that are, in this case, populated with labeled scenes from Mother Goose, Grimm’s Fairy Tales, and other familiar rhymes and tales. The Three Blind Mice and the Three Wise Men anchor the map on the lower righthand and lefthand corners, while Old Mother Goose watches the cow jump over the moon, and a twinkling star at the top of the composition. Snow White, Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, and even Moby Dick, the white whale, make an appearance, as do Jack and his beanstalk, Old King Cole, and the Pied Piper. We encourage viewers to compare and contrast the various story land and fairy land maps hung throughout the exhibit and notice how different artists depict familiar tales in a variety of different ways.
3. The Guide to Toyland
Hale & Sons Department Store (Waukon, Iowa), ca. 1920s
Courtesy of the Collection of Stephen Hornsby
This cover of a Christmas toy catalogue produced by Hale & Sons department store in the small town of Waukon, Iowa, in the late 1920s demonstrates the role of commercial graphic art in shaping a child’s fantasy world. The colorful design combines traditional images of Christmas with popular nursery rhymes (Little Bo-Peep, Humpty Dumpty, Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe) and children’s stories (Cinderella, Treasure Island, Wizard of Oz). The map shows a trail, which starts bottom right (the front cover of the catalogue), winds through ToyTown, full of industrious elves making toys, to Golden Mountain and Christmas Tree Forest, and finishes in Santa’s Castle at the North Pole. On the way to Santa’s Castle, children have to fend off dragons, pirates, and trolls.
4. Map of Ye Yuletide Trail
Amstadter Storage & Van Co., Inc., ca. 1930s
Courtesy of the Collection of Stephen Hornsby
This Christmas card map, produced for a Chicago transport company, promises “No Detours/Drive Straight Through to a Merry Christmas and A Great New Year.” The map unfolds to show a “State of Happiness” and a road running diagonally from bottom left to top right. Along the way, the driver has a “fill up with friendliness,” drives to “Good Will Inn,” enters “Peaceful Valley,” and eventually reaches the final destination of “Merry Christmas.” Like other Christmas card maps of this era, the card includes comforting sentiments such as “Soft Shoulders” and a “Good Time Ahead.” The Art Deco feel to the compass rose and the streamlined automobile styling suggests the map dates to the 1930s.
5. Your Personal Guide to Disneyland
Disneyland, Inc., 1956
www.oshermaps.org/map/56508
We would be hard pressed to host a fantasy map exhibition without including maps from the fantasy-laden Walt Disney universe. D23 Fantastic Worlds, printed in 2020, represents the contemporary world of Walt Disney, focusing solely on fantasy locations or locations created for Disney or Pixar stories. There are over 250 places and Easter eggs featured on the map, derived from over 168 films, television shows, and theme park locations. D23 is the “official” Disney Fan Club, and this map was the 2020 gift for Gold Members. An insider tells us that there are 23 “hidden Mickey’s” on this map. Can you find them all?
Theme park maps are a whole separate genre of fantasy maps, and to that end, the smaller “Personal Guide to Disneyland” map was created in 1956 for visitors to Disneyland in Anaheim, California, just one year after the park opened. For longtime fans of Disney theme parks, we hope this map offers a bit of welcome nostalgia.
6. Never Never Island
Walt Disney Productions, 1952
Courtesy of the Collection of Stephen Hornsby
Disney produced this fantasy map prior to the release of the animated film Peter Pan in 1953. Loosely based on Neverland in J.M. Barrie’s play Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up (1904), Walt Disney’s map shows Captain Hook’s pirate ship in Cannibal Cove, a mermaid on a rock beside Mermaid’s Lagoon, and Great Big Little Panther and three wigwams at “Indian Camp.” Disney added extra locations not found in Barrie’s version of Neverland, including Skull Rock and Crocodile Creek. The map’s fluid graphic style makes this an instantly recognizable Disney product.
7. D23 Fantastic Worlds
Bryan Mon, Disney Enterprises, 2020
www.oshermaps.org/map/56532
We would be hard pressed to host a fantasy map exhibition without including maps from the fantasy-laden Walt Disney universe. D23 Fantastic Worlds, printed in 2020, represents the contemporary world of Walt Disney, focusing solely on fantasy locations or locations created for Disney or Pixar stories. There are over 250 places and Easter eggs featured on the map, derived from over 168 films, television shows, and theme park locations. D23 is the “official” Disney Fan Club, and this map was the 2020 gift for Gold Members. An insider tells us that there are 23 “hidden Mickey’s” on this map. Can you find them all?
Theme park maps are a whole separate genre of fantasy maps, and to that end, the smaller “Personal Guide to Disneyland” map was created in 1956 for visitors to Disneyland in Anaheim, California, just one year after the park opened. For longtime fans of Disney theme parks, we hope this map offers a bit of welcome nostalgia.
