1931 Map of the HWEN area

[John TeSelle]

Long before there were Google Maps and satellite photos, the Sanborn Map Company produced detailed maps of urban areas for use by insurance underwriters. They are a great resource to anyone interested in how the city looked years ago.

Here is a composite of the Hillsboro-West End area (circa 1931), in a PDF file. This is best viewed by downloading to the desktop so that you can zoom in to an area of interest using Acrobat or Reader:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qEvsUa52eT_4WaJsEdp765Szsa9A3rxz/view?usp=sharing

There are some gaps and mis-alignments in this image because the maps were published in book form, with a key to different pages. A single composite like this makes them easier to read, but sometimes the edges don't fit together perfectly and some text is upside down due to the orientation in the original publication.

If you really want to go down the rabbit hole with the Sanborn Company, here is a link to the full catalog of Nashville maps at the Library of Congress:

https://www.loc.gov/maps/?fa=partof%3Asanborn+maps%7Clocation%3Atennessee%7Clocation%3Anashville&c=25&all=true&st=list

 - John TeSelle

John TeSelle Architecture
405 Fairfax Avenue
Nashville, TN  37212
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www.jt-architecture.com