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1894 Map of Reading

Name: 1894 Topographic Map of Reading
Creator: U.S. Geological Survey
Published: 1912
License: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

USGS Topo · Published 1912

About this map

Reading serves as the industrial and transportation nexus of Berks County in this late 19th-century survey, where the Schuylkill River and the Schuylkill Canal intersect a dense web of rail lines. The city’s dense street grid is flanked by the steep elevations of Mt. Penn and Neversink Mt., providing a stark contrast between the urban core and the family-named landmarks and rural outposts that define the surrounding townships. Local genealogists will find significant value in the detailed placement of settlements such as Mohns Store, Shoemakersville, and Stonersville.

The map documents a landscape defined by water and iron-age infrastructure, tracing the paths of the Philadelphia and Reading R.R. and the Wilmington & Northern R.R. as they follow the river valleys. Outside the city, the presence of landmarks like Spies Church and various mill sites along Maiden Creek and Antietam Creek illustrates the settlement patterns of early Pennsylvania German communities before the extensive suburbanization of the following century.