Talleres Graficos Peuser
Argentine and Uruguayan Wools, 1970.
Textile Museum Sheet Map Collection
https://oshermaps.org/map/51163.0001
“I was to spend two weeks entirely in Buenos Aires, Argentina; I would be staying in the neighborhoods of Palermo and Recoleta. I had been asked to be part of an evaluation team to visit and evaluate a study abroad program based in Buenos Aires for one week. We would be visiting universities, meeting with on-site staff and students, observing classes, visiting internship and volunteer sites throughout the city. In addition, I had extended my stay to visit with dear Argentine friends and former colleagues with whom I had previously worked and not seen for more than a decade. I was going to meet one friend’s three-year old child for the first time and another friend had invited me to their home for the weekend. I’m certain that we would have enjoyed a typical Argentine “asado,” a plethora of grilled meats. One evening last March (2020), when I was supposed to be in Buenos Aires, I busily looked up recipes and made homemade Argentine empanadas and found a lovely Argentine malbec to reminisce about an unrealized journey.”
-Christine Wintersteen
Cornelis de Jode
Brazil and Peru, Dedicated to the brave and magnificent Theodore Echter of Meselburg, 1593.
Osher Sheet Map Collection
https://oshermaps.org/map/328.0001
“The trip was to attend a meeting of the International Sociological Association, where approximately 5,000 sociologists from around the world gather, each time in a different country, for a conference. I have been attending meetings of the ISA since 1986. It is an opportunity to connect with sociologists from outside the US and to see and understand from their perspectives. I also love traveling to countries and being able to sightsee with sociology friends I know through the ISA (and don’t see otherwise). The local ISA planning committee always arranges sightseeing tours that wouldn’t be on commercial routes. I had never been to Brazil before, and I was looking forward to seeing the city of Porto Alegre (the conference venue) and to staying with my sociology friends from the Netherlands, Austria, and Germany, whom I hadn’t seen since 2016. I was supposed to give two papers about my research, on panels where I was the only US sociologist. The conference was rescheduled to Feb. 23-28, 2021, to a remote format. I “saw” my friends and colleagues on Zoom, presented my work, and heard about the work of others, but I wasn’t able to hang out with anyone, and remote conferences simply aren’t as gratifying as in-person ones. I doubt I will ever travel to Brazil and I was really looking forward to it.” -Susan Bell
California Division of Water Resources
California Aqueduct System of the California Water Plan, 1956.
Osher Sheet Map Collection
https://oshermaps.org/map/50548.0001
“The [cancelled] trip was for an event in Napa called ‘Live In The Vineyard,’ which is a music industry event where labels showcase their artists at various vineyards and venues. Attendees are key tastemakers in the industry such as radio programmers and music supervisors. Unfortunately everything had to move online and we had a completely virtual showcase. Normally, we’d all be flying or taking tour buses to Napa.” -Brian Day
“I had a training scheduled at the Bepress headquarters in Berkeley. I was going to fly out to San Francisco and spend a day or two in the city, and then make my way to Berkeley for the three-day workshop. The training was scheduled for March 24, 2020, and in the weeks leading up to the trip California was going under lockdown due to the widespread outbreak of COVID-19. The University restricted air travel around March 11, and we wisely cancelled. I had postponed this training for four years because I thought that the expense seemed frivolous, but now having spent the year with meager professional development opportunities I regret not having taken it sooner.” -Jessica Hovey
Heinrich Scherer
A New and trustworthy geographic description of the Circumpolar regions of Lappland and Greenland, 1701.
Osher Sheet Map Collection
https://oshermaps.org/map/561.0001
“I am one of ten high school teachers nationwide who was chosen through a competitive application process for the 2020 PolarTREC Teacher Program. I was chosen to join a team of glaciologists studying subglacial hydrology at the bed of the Greenland ice sheet and its impact of meltwater on rising sea levels. My application included a proposal that links what is going on in Greenland to economic, political, environmental, and social impacts of rising sea levels in The Gulf of Maine. The goal of the program is to increase teaching, interest, and knowledge in Polar Regions for students and community members. We were due to depart for training in Boulder, Colorado last March and for Ilulissat, Greenland, and the West Greenland Ice Sheet in August of 2020. About a week before departure, we were notified that we would not be traveling to Boulder and that the entire five-day training would take place online.
As a veteran of global professional development programs for teachers, we missed out on being able to connect with our cohort, not ideal in helping us to have shared experiences and getting to know one another at deeper levels professionally. Teachers traveling on programs like this often stay in touch throughout the entirety of their careers due to shared goals. My expedition was postponed due to COVID travel restrictions here in the United States and in Greenland. It was rescheduled for 2021 and postponed again. The next departure date is set for August of 2022. Although disappointing, it has given me a lot of time to develop knowledge about the expedition, research they are working on, and background content needed to serve as somewhat of a translator for students and the public. […] It truly has been quite a year.” -Erin Towns
Joris Hoefnagel, Georg Braun & Frans Hogenberg
Prague, in the Kingdom of Bohemia, 1596.
Osher Sheet Map Collection
https://oshermaps.org/map/50291.0001
“I was scheduled to present at the World Archaeological Congress in Prague in July of 2020, but the event was cancelled. The World Archaeological Congress meets only once every four years and I had been planning on presenting at this conference for some time. Conference participation is important for my tenure and promotion and when meetings are cancelled, it is difficult to fill that void. The World Archaeological Congress postponed this event until July 2022. I hope to attend.” -Bonnie Newsom
James Morrison
Germany and Its Approaches, with International Boundaries as of September 1, 1939, the day Germany invaded Poland and, in red, Boundaries as of January 1, 1938, before Germany seized Austria and Czechoslovakia. Compiled and drawn in the Cartographic Section of the National Geographic Society for the National Geographic Magazine, 1945.
Osher Sheet Map Collection
https://oshermaps.org/map/1546.0001
“I was planning to do up to a month of archival research in early 2021 at the Wiener Library on London’s Russell Square. […] Then I was planning to fly to Berlin for map research in German archives, and on to as-yet unchosen Holocaust sites in Eastern Europe for field work. Nothing is more meaningful to a geographer than seeing the place you are studying on the ground, in person—to study the landscape, feel the weather, walk the distances from here to there. I think of it every day.” -Anne Kelly Knowles
Gerhard Mercator
Africa Ex magna orbis terrae descriptione Gerardi Mercatoris desumpta, Studio & industria G.M. Iunioris., 1633
Osher Sheet Map Collection
https://oshermaps.org/map/394.0001
“I was supposed to go on two weeks of work travel to Mozambique and ten days of work travel to Senegal in early 2021. We were also planning a trip to Martinique in the fall. None of that happened because we weren’t allowed to travel by our employer [National Museum of African American History and Culture] and other guidelines.” -Dr. Kate McMahon
“I was going on a coffee trip for business. I had just returned from the African Fine Coffee Conference in Kenya and was soon to head to Addis Ababa and a tour of coffee farms in Ethiopia. My first trip there having had two prior ones cancelled due to war in the region. We were to land in Addis Ababa and travel to Hawassa, Yirga Alem, Bensa, Dilla, Langano then back to Addis. We were then traveling to Rwanda arriving in Kigali. […]This was one of two business trips canceled due to Covid. The impact in not going was both personal and professional. I was not able to visit farms and source potential new coffees but also to learn more about the people in the regions we buy coffee from. I believe that I cannot sell coffee unless I truly understand the people who work hard to grow and provide us with outstanding coffee beans.” -Mary Allen Lindemann
S. Augustus Mitchell & J.H. Young
Map of Mexico, Guatemala, and the West Indies, 1849.
Story Sheet Map Collection
https://oshermaps.org/map/12641.0001
“My husband was supposed to teach a four-week summer class at the University of Guadalajara in Guadalajara, Mexico. I was going to travel with him. When COVID lockdowns went into effect, both his home university and the University of Guadalajara decided to cancel the program.” -Jennifer McCutchen
Federal Writers’ Project
New Mexico, 1940
Richard Auletta Collection
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“I was unable to attend the Southwest Art History annual conference in Taos, New Mexico, which I have attended for nearly 20 years. Until vaccinations become widely available, only necessary travel has been undertaken.” -Anonymous
Hjalmar Petersen and Else von Essen
Tourist in Denmark, 1956
Richard Auletta Collection
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“I was planning to attend the following conferences: the ECIS (Marrakech), ICIS (Hyderabad), and AMCIS (Salt Lake City) conferences this past year. All were changed to virtual. I was also supposed to be a visiting professor at Aarhus University in Denmark; that changed to virtual synchronous teaching. I had also been meeting with my colleagues in Quebec City each month until the pandemic hit. That closed the US/Canada border, which stopped all crossings for me. So any work has gone virtual. I moved from Quebec City to Maine in 2018 but had a few things left in storage, which are still there and I have not been able to go and get my furniture. My parents are aging and I would like to visit them in Japan but all travel has stopped. I usually visit once a year and was planning on visiting twice starting in 2020. This has halted. Instead I have stayed mostly in or near my home in Buxton.” -Anonymous
Federal Writers’ Project
Florida, 1940
Richard Auletta Collection
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“I was scheduled to deliver a conference paper for C19 The Society of Nineteenth-Century Americanists in April, 2020 in Coral Gables, Florida. The conference was canceled and later went virtual via Zoom on October 16-18, 2020.” -Eve Allegra Raimon
Federal Writers’ Project
Arizona, 1940
Richard Auletta Collection
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“I was going to attend an NEDCC conference to both learn from and connect with colleagues in the digital preservation field. My colleague and I planned to stay in a funky hotel in downtown Tucson, attend the conference, and then drive a rental car up to the Grand Canyon (because, why the heck not). On the way, we planned to stop in Phoenix and Flagstaff – also staying at funky “haunted” hotels. I had received a small grant from the USM staff senate that covered my conference fees, and was really excited to have the opportunity to learn more about my field. […] The conference was supposed to happen in early April of 2020. I remember them rescheduling to October 2020 fairly early on (maybe March). Cancelling flights and hotels wasn’t fun. On the upside, we were able to attend the virtual Digital Commonwealth conference (which turned out to be deeply prescient) which we would have missed had we made it to Arizona. That Arizona trip is the last trip I remember looking forward to. I haven’t left Maine since Leap Day, 2020.”
-Mary Holt
Federal Writers’ Project
Maryland, 1940
Richard Auletta Collection
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“I planned to attend a professional conference and then spend some personal time exploring the Baltimore and Washington D.C. area.”
-Rebecca Roche
Jacques Nicolas Bellin
Map of the Island of Antigua…, in Le Petit Atlas Maritime Collection Of Maps And Plans Of The Four Parts Of The World. In Five Volumes, 1764.
Smith Atlas Collection
https://oshermaps.org/map/1959.0180
“Right before the pandemic began, things were building up toward an amazing professional collaboration in Antigua. The head of the national museum had obtained his Ph.D. under archaeologist Doug Armstrong of Syracuse University, whom I had known when I was a visiting instructor at SUNY ESF (co-located at Syracuse’s campus) in the 1980s. And, two friends of mine, one retired from USM and Tulane University (Dave Davis) who had done archaeological work in Antigua and the other, Nathan Hamilton (an archaeology professor at USM), were all looking at going to Antigua, with our spouses, and with Lydia Savage, a geographer at USM. So, the trip would have been a working vacation planned for June of 2020 and could have led to something really interesting for cultural resource collaboration and for crafting student opportunities.”
-Rob Sanford
