The original title, Virginia, crowns George F. Cram Company’s 1920 survey with an assured modern clarity. Renowned for elevating educational cartography into an exacting art, Cram organizes the Commonwealth with luminous color and disciplined linework. Roads unfurl in purposeful bands—major highways in red, state roads in blue—while electric lines, called out in red per the legend’s symbology, telegraph the era’s accelerating connectivity. Counties and independent cities are crisply distinguished in green, a chromatic architecture that makes governance feel tangible. Subtle hachures lend the land a tactility of slope and ridge, so that geography, infrastructure, and administration converse at a glance. The result is a practical state portrait—lucid, data-rich, and unmistakably of its moment—yet composed with a designer’s eye for balance and legibility.

Administrative clarity is the map’s quiet triumph. County lines and city limits, traced in green, organize Virginia’s civic mosaic from the tidal margins to the mountain hem. Richmond stands central as capital and crossroads, while Alexandria anchors the Potomac approach. Charlottesville, Lynchburg, and Roanoke articulate the Piedmont and valley interiors, nodes in a lattice of governance and trade. Along the lower Chesapeake, the Hampton Roads constellation—Norfolk, Newport News, and Hampton—gathers maritime and urban energies. The stretches that now include Virginia Beach and Chesapeake appear as coastal and inland districts within the broader Tidewater framework, their shorelines, inlets, and approaches carefully situated. This political skeleton, cleanly drawn, becomes the interpretive key through which every road, river crossing, and utility line gains civic meaning.

Transportation is rendered with a planner’s specificity and a traveler’s intuition. Red arterial highways stride across the state, meeting blue state roads that braid counties to markets and courts. Electric lines, distinctly symbolized in red per the legend, map the reach of power—literal and economic—across townships and farms. Nowhere is this convergence more vivid than in the detailed inset of Norfolk, Newport News, and vicinity, where maritime approaches and shorelines coordinate dense routes serving harbors and neighborhoods. The palette clarifies without clutter: each network stands legible on its own yet composes a single, navigable system. One can trace a journey from the mountains to the tidewater in sequential hues, feeling how modernity in 1920 traveled by road and by wire, often to the same destinations.

Subtly hatched relief imparts a lived sense of terrain, guiding the eye from the flat gleam of the Tidewater through the rolling Piedmont to the rugged Blue Ridge and Valley lands. Elevation is not shouted but insinuated; slopes gather into ridges, and watersheds resolve into the logic of routes and settlements. Great river corridors—the James and the Potomac especially—become narrative threads, their crossings and bends echoing in the placement of towns and the turning of roads. The technique is classical and efficient: hachures suggest ascent and aspect without drowning the page, so that topography remains an ever-present, legible companion to infrastructure. In Cram’s hands, relief is more than backdrop; it is a rationale, explaining why paths curve, jurisdictions meet, and communities cluster where they do.

The map’s quiet trove of 1920 census indicators turns geography into social history. Density gradations reveal where people gathered most intensely—around Richmond and across the Hampton Roads arc—and where settlement thins into valleys, farms, and upland towns. Read against the overlaid highways, state roads, and electric lines, the pattern becomes a portrait of opportunity and access at the dawn of the motor age. This is where Cram’s reputation matters: the company’s devotion to clear, comparative information makes the page a tool for scholars and a joy for connoisseurs. As a time capsule of Virginia’s early twentieth‑century infrastructure and civic order, it invites comparison with today’s counties and cities, rewarding every revisit with fresh connections between landform, movement, and the lives mapped in between.

Cities and towns on this map

• Virginia Beach
• Norfolk
• Chesapeake
• Richmond
• Newport News
• Hampton
• Roanoke
• Lynchburg
• Alexandria
• Charlottesville

Notable Features & Landmarks

• Inset Map: Detailed view of Norfolk, Newport News, and vicinity.
• Electric Lines: Clearly marked in red, demonstrating the infrastructure development of the time.
• Highways and Roads: Delineated in red (major highways) and blue (state roads) for clarity.
• Administrative Boundaries: Counties and city limits outlined in green, facilitating identification of physical locations.
• Population Density Indicators: Offers insights into areas with higher population concentrations based on the 1920 census.
• Cartographic Legend: Provides a key to understanding types of lines and symbols used on the map.

Historical and design context

• Created by: George F. Cram Company, 1920.
• George F. Cram Company was known for producing high-quality maps and educational materials in the early 20th century, contributing to cartographic projects across the United States.
• Design/style: Vibrant colors distinguish elements—roads in red and blue, electric lines in red—for enhanced usability.
• Relief depiction: Hachured lines indicate elevation changes, providing a topographical perspective.
• Historical significance: A historical artifact illustrating Virginia’s geography, transportation routes, and socio-economic landscape in the early 20th century.
• Geographic focus: The state of Virginia, showcasing its counties and major cities.

Looking for a particular place? Review the detailed images to confirm that the town, landmark or feature you have in mind appears on the map. If you are unsure, ask our workshop to check before you order.

Detailed maps are especially rewarding at larger sizes, where names, boundaries and decorative features have more room to be appreciated. Use the close-up preview and size guide to choose the right scale for your wall.

This map looks amazing at sizes all the way up to 50in (125cm). If you are looking for a larger map, please get in touch.

The model in the listing images is holding the 18x24in (45x60cm) version of this map.

Where personalisation is available, you can add a short title or dedication, mark one meaningful place, or request one considered visual detail. See personalised map examples.

Every piece is printed to museum-grade archival standards using fade-resistant pigment inks on acid-free matte paper. Choose an unframed map print, framed map or canvas using the finish options above. Framed maps use crystal-clear optical acrylic and arrive ready to hang.

With its rich detail and strong sense of place, this map makes a considered gift for a new home, anniversary, retirement or anyone with a personal connection to the area shown. Still deciding? Explore our collection of rare old and vintage maps to discover another place, period or style.

This map is also available as a float framed canvas, sometimes known as a shadow gap framed canvas or canvas floater. The map is printed on artist's cotton canvas and then stretched over a handmade box frame. We then "float" the canvas inside a wooden frame, which is available in a range of colours (black, dark brown, oak, antique gold and white). This is a wonderful way to present a map without glazing in front. See some examples of float framed canvas maps and explore the differences between my different finishes.

For something truly unique, this map is also available in "Unique 3D", our trademarked process that dramatically transforms the map so that it has a wonderful sense of depth. We combine the original map with detailed topography and elevation data, so that mountains and the terrain really "pop". For more info and examples of 3D maps, check my Unique 3D page.