Hydrographical Basin of the Upper Mississippi River (J. N. Nicollet, 1843)
Joseph Nicollet and John C. Frémont's War Department map of the upper Mississippi country — the most accurate map of its era, made with Dakota and Ojibwe guides. It names each nation's country — Mdewakanton, Wahpekute, Sisseton, Yankton, Yanktonai, Teton, Ojibwe, Ho-Chunk, Sac and Fox, Omaha, Otoe, Ioway, Ponca, Pawnee — with villages and hundreds of Dakota and Ojibwe place names: Mini Wakan, Kichi Gummi, Minsi Sagaigoning.
Source
| Map | Hydrographical Basin of the Upper Mississippi River |
|---|---|
| Author | J. N. Nicollet, assisted by J. C. Frémont; U.S. War Department, Bureau of the Corps of Topographical Engineers, 1843 |
| Archive | Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division · 1:1,200,000 |
| Rights | Public domain. A U.S. War Department publication (1843): public domain as a federal work and by age. The Library of Congress scan is free to use and reuse. Evidence |
| Accuracy | About 25 km (RMS 17 km at 22 control points). The southern sheet lands within ~10 km; the northern sheet, surveyed by canoe and dead reckoning in the lake country, is nearer 20–25 km. A small mismatch band runs along the sheet joint near 43.5°N. |
| Method | The map is two separately registered sheets; each fitted with a second-order polynomial to lakes, river junctions, falls and towns (22 control points kept), samples routed by sheet. See the methodology. |
| Version | 1.0.0, updated 2026-09-17 |
| Covers | Minnesota, Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Wisconsin |
Changelog
- 1.0.0 (2026-09-17): First release: 22 control points across two sheet fits, tinted and scan layers, z4–z10.
Control points
The full list of control points with residuals is in control-points.geojson. Historic names indexed for search: names.geojson.