San Francisco Historic Maps
On March 11th, 2026, from 1 to 2pm, this talk was given by Tom Paper and Jim Schein at the Century Club of California in San Francisco. Remarks of the talk here.On July 31st, 2025, from 5 to 7pm, a reception and presentation about San Francisco Historic Maps was held at YesSF, the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce's gallery space at 220 Montgomery Street. About 95 people attended the presentation given by Tom Paper, Founder of Pixeum, and Jim Schein, Founder of Schein & Schein. Remarks of the talk here.A group of about 35 maps from this presentation were viewable in the YesSF gallery space, from Monday July 27, 2025 through Friday, August 1st, 2025. Follow-ups from the 7/31/25 eventBooks about SF:Imperial San FranciscoWhen the Water Came Up To Market StreetTowers of GoldSeasons of the WitchGold Mountain Big City Tom Paper is Founder of Pixeum, a website that helps people tell stories with art. Jim Schein is Founder of Schein & Schein, a map and print store originally based in North Beach.Biography of Jim ScheinJim Schein is the passionate founder of Schein & Schein, a renowned map and print store originally based in San Francisco’s North Beach neighborhood. With his wife, Marti, he opened the shop in 2003, combining a deep love for cartography, history, and travel into a unique retail experience that quickly became a cornerstone for map enthusiasts and collectors12.Schein grew up surrounded by academic influence, with close family pursuing careers in geography and landscape architecture. Diverging from a more traditional academic path, Jim charted his own journey—first as a manager in music logistics, where touring internationally allowed him to frequent antiquarian bookstores and amass a diverse map collection3. Eventually, his dedication to maps led him to establish his own store, nurturing a business with a personal touch and encyclopedic expertise in antique cartography.Schein & Schein thrived for nearly two decades, offering thousands of authentic maps and prints from the 14th to 20th centuries, especially highlighting San Francisco, California, and wine country. Jim’s zeal is not just for selling objects, but sharing stories—he’s been celebrated for preserving the tactile and historical aspects of maps in a digital age. In addition to curating rare items, he authored a book titled "Gold Mountain Big City," further cementing his status as a prominent figure in the world of cartography1.https://www.scheinandschein.com/about-serviceshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIlgRcEChIIhttps://www.inquirer.com/philly/living/20151101_Finding_a_new_career_in_his_zeal_for_maps.htmlhttps://www.scheinandschein.comhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERbvVpWNwOMhttps://handfulofsalt.wordpress.com/2010/03/18/stores-we-love-schein-schein/ The exhibit of San Francisco Historic Maps is available as a pop-up exhibit for venues with 150 lineal feet of wall space. See below for information about prior exhibits...As a part of The California Map Society's Spring Conference, on June 28, 2025, Tom presented his digital collection of maps of San Francisco and what he finds most meaningful about each map. He hopes to inspire people to explore these maps further on their own at www.pixeum.org. This exhibit was first presented by Jim Schein and Tom Paper on April 18, 2019, at the offices of Webster Pacific in downtown San Francisco. The date, April 18, was the anniversary of the great earthquake and fire of 1906. The exhibit was a pop-up, which meant that it was put up and taken down within a span of six hours. Every image was printed and mounted onto a posterboard and then rested on a portable easel.
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The Arabian Nights - 1899
...7/8/24 (updated 11/29/25)The Arabian Nights Entertainments published by George Newnes is a notable illustrated edition of the classic collection of Middle Eastern folktales known as The Arabian Nights or One Thousand and One Nights. This edition was released in parts around 1899 and featured illustrations by artists such as W. Heath Robinson, Helen Stratton, A.D. McCormick, A.L. Davis, and A.E. Norbury. It includes famous stories like those of Scheherazade, Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, Sinbad the Sailor, and Aladdin's Magic Lamp, presented in a richly illustrated format meant to captivate readers of all ages.This publication was well regarded for its beautiful and imaginative illustrations that complemented the tales' magical and exotic themes. The format often emphasized the nested storytelling style, where stories flow into one another through characters telling other stories, creating a layered and mesmerizing narrative experience. George Newnes Ltd. was the publisher, known for producing popular illustrated books in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.In summary, George Newnes' Arabian Nights Entertainments is a richly illustrated late 19th-century edition of this classic folklore collection, valued both for its artistry and its engaging presentation of timeless tales.Source: Perplexity.aiCurated by G. Ly
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Wildflowers of America - 1894
7/9/24 (updated 11/25/25)The series "Wild Flowers of America" published by G.H. Buek and Co. in 1894 is a botanical work featuring detailed and accurate illustrations of wildflowers from every state in the American Union. It was issued as a weekly botanical fine art publication and later compiled into a bound book edition. The series contains 288 color illustrations of flowers with corresponding explanatory text, emphasizing botanical accuracy by depicting each flower as it grows naturally, rather than artistic fantasy, to maximize educational value. The publication had contributions from a corps of special artists and botanists and was endorsed by leading artists and university botanists from America and Europe. It was designed to familiarize Americans with their native wildflowers in detail and color.The book is an oblong quarto with a burgundy cloth cover, decorative lettering and floral designs, and gilt edges, indicating it was a quality production. Its introduction highlights the intention to provide a realistic representation of wildflowers for botanical learning, resisting the common trend of fanciful imagery in botanical commemoratives at the time.Source: Perplexity.aiCurated by Gabrielle Ly
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Mother Goose Nursery Rhymes
Mother Goose Nursery Rhymes, published by the W. B. Conkey Company, features a large selection of rhymes, poems, and accompanying illustrations. Some of the nursery rhymes are written as sheet music, while others tell moral tales about anthropomorphic animals. It's a delightful, though sometimes dated, set of amusing works for children.Source: https://www.perplexity.ai/search/tell-me-about-mother-goose-wGnYDJXPR6Cgyd4WLGkd6A#1 History of Mother Goose - perplexity >>> Mother Goose is a legendary figure in children’s literature, best known as the supposed author of tales and nursery rhymes beloved for centuries. The name first appeared in French literature in the late 1600s, when Charles Perrault published Contes de ma Mère l’Oye (“Tales of Mother Goose”) in 1697, introducing classics like Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty. Translated into English in 1729, the collection established Mother Goose as a storytelling icon across Europe and beyond.wikipedia+2The concept, however, may be much older. French legends trace her to “Bertha the Spinner” or “Goose-Foot Bertha,” a queen from the 10th or 11th century famed for captivating children with stories. In America, a popular but apocryphal tale identifies her as a Bostonian woman—either Elizabeth or Mary Goose—whose son-in-law allegedly published her rhymes in the early 1700s.pookpress+2By the 18th century, the English publisher John Newbery helped cement her association with nursery rhymes through his Mother Goose’s Melody (c. 1765). Whether myth or memory, Mother Goose became a symbol of early childhood literature—an enduring, grandmotherly figure whose songs and stories bridged generations and cultures.poetryfoundation+2https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother_Goosehttps://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/mother-goosehttps://www.pookpress.co.uk/project/mother-goose-rhymes-history/https://www.library.illinois.edu/rbx/2018/01/23/who-was-mother-goose/https://bookriot.com/a-brief-history-of-mother-goose/https://rodbenson.com/2021/07/28/who-is-mother-goose/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoDDeIdfoMMhttps://kids.britannica.com/students/article/Mother-Goose/275950https://americansongwriter.com/who-was-mother-goose-really-and-what-is-the-meaning-behind-her-story/https://iew.com/support/blog/who-was-mother-goosehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histoires_ou_contes_du_temps_pass%C3%A9
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