Zoom meeting #14, 22 November 2021. 'Milemarkers, sign boards & boundary posts and OS maps'

• Presenter: Dr. Richard Oliver
• Format: A talk by Richard, followed by a Q&A session
• View the recording here, streaming length: 1hr 41m

This talk covered mile stones and posts, boundary stones and posts, and ‘guide posts’ – the OS term for what most of us call ‘signposts’. Milemarkers in particular have been subject to varying styles of depiction, but up to 1960 on the larger scales included an indication of all or some of the text. This is of particular interest where the milemarker is no longer extant: mile posts were cast-iron, and many seem to have been lost in the ‘scrap drive’ during World War II. This can also create puzzles, such as mile-distances shown in eighths of a mile, rather than round miles. Using OS and other maps, Richard showed how the text of apparently ‘lost’ milemarkers might be reconstructed, and how distances on maps in furlongs can be explained. He also showed that there are pitfalls, including ‘milestones’ that weren’t orthodox, and railway and canal distance markers. He described an illustrated some boundary markers, showing there to be four basic types; those on open moorland are very different from those along fenced roads showing maintenance responsibilities. The final section of the talk discussed ‘guide posts’: are 19th century OS maps reliable indicators of their distribution? Were they much less common at rural road junctions than they are today? Examples were shown that were believed to antedate the first large-scale OS survey of their sites, but which didn’t apparently appear on the published maps: or did they?!    

 Zoom meeting #13, 8 November 2021. 'Publication of the 25" by parishes: was Scotland treated differently'

• Chairperson: Dr. Rob Wheeler
• Format: A talk by Rob, followed by a Q&A session
• View the recording here, streaming length: 1hr 24m

The manner in which the 1:2500 survey first appeared is often perceived as incomplete, a consequence of the gradual progress of the survey. Rob argues that on the contrary it aimed at a different type of map a Parish Map that consisted of all the sheets of a parish mounted together, for whose users whatever lay across the parish boundary was thought to be of no interest. This concept was badly flawed. The decision to abandon it seems to have been made in 1871-2 and was acted on in Scotland rather more eagerly than in England.   

Zoom meeting #12, 7 June 2021. 'Swiss 1:50,000 Topo Mapping'

• Chairperson: Gavin Johns
• Assisted & encouraged by: Bill Batchelor, Richard Oliver, Dave Watt and Gerry Zierler
• View the recording here, streaming length: 1hr 41m

Gavin Johns presented a session on the history and beauty of Swiss Topo maps. Part historical overview and part 'show and tell' we looked at some of the world’s best mapping .... examining - briefly - their historic development, the National Map series and some of the distinctive features encountered across Swiss terrain from linguistic borders to glaciers and landslides. Specifically the 1:50,000 scale maps, the presentation is more of an appreciation of the styles and techniques in producing these beautiful maps rather than a definative history.    

Zoom meeting #11, 19 April 2021. 'Aviation Maps'

• Chairperson: Ian Byrne
• 47 members attended
• View the recording here, streaming length: 1hr 47m (the introductions are missing, so its straight into the detail)

This was a Show & Tell meeting hosted by Ian Byrne with a Q&A afterwards.   

Zoom meeting #10, 22 March 2021. 'The OS Half-Inch Map'

• Chairperson: Richard Oliver
• 60+ members attended
• Read the report of the meeting here

This lecture by Richard Oliver with a Q&A afterwards was an introduction to the Ordnance Survey half-inch map series, which several CCS members have been working on since even before CCS was formed! In Britain the series was introduced in 1902-3 in response to pressure from the army, and for the next 20 years they regarded it as the primary topographic map of the country. It went through several rethinks and redesigns, and arguably never achieved a ‘definitive’ form. In 1922 the army decided they liked the one-inch instead, and the half-inch had to survive or fall as a civil map. Efforts after 1930 at restyling and redrawing were frustrated first by the war and then by a lack of money, and the series came effectively to an end in Britain in the 1960s. In Ireland it had a different career: in the Republic it came to be the standard map of the country by the 1950s, and lasted, with some interesting changes of detail, until replaced by the 1:50,000 in the 1990s. 

Zoom meeting #9, 22 February 2021. 'Railway Line Plans & their use of OS Material'

• Chairperson: Gavin Johns
• 70+ members attended
• View the recording here, streaming length: 1hr 32m

The meeting was attended by over 70 Members (with some banging on the door to get in!), a hugely popular subject with very interesting content and discussion. The presentation looked at examples of an under used resource railway line/property plans and in particular the use made of OS materials in their preparation. Their use was particularly prevalent after 1923 when many Companies were merged and up to date plans were required.. We looked in detail at the GWR which used 1/2500 material, updated it and presented it on plans in a distinctive format. The railways looked at were Devon's Teign Valley; the Cambrian lines in Mid-Wales and the Corris Railway in Wales. The image to the right is copyrighted to Gavin Johns and is not for reproduction.