About World Globes

Abel Janszoon Tasman (1603 - 1659), was a Dutch seafarer, explorer, and merchant.

Tasman is best known for his voyages of 1642 and 1644 in the service of the
United East India Company. He was the first known European expedition
to reach the islands of Van Diemen’s Land (now Tasmania) and New Zealand and to sight the Fiji islands, which he did in 1643. Tasman also mapped substantial portions of Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands.

On 24 November 1642 Abel Tasman sighted the west coast of Tasmania, north of Macquarie Harbour. He named his discovery Van Diemen’s Land (now Tasmania) after Antonie van Diemen, Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies.  After some exploration, Tasman had intended to proceed in a northerly direction but as the wind was unfavourable he steered east.  On 13 December they sighted land on the north-west coast of the South Island, New Zealand, becoming the first Europeans to do so.  On route back to Batavia, Tasman came across the Tongan archipelago on 20 January 1643.
With three ships on his second voyage (Limmen, Zeemeeuw and the tender Braek) in 1644, he followed the south coast of New Guinea eastward. He missed the Torres Strait between New Guinea and Australia, and continued his voyage along the Australian coast. He mapped the north coast of Australia making observations on the land and its people.

His voyages were most important during the age of discovery, but led to nothing for over a century, until the era of James Cook, Tasmania and New Zealand were not visited by Europeans - mainland Australia was visited, but usually only by accident.

We must marvel at the courage and determination of these explorers to explore uncharted waters and territories making it possible to have to world globes of today.  Today, we use GPS systems to chart our way across town!

References:  Edward Duyker (ed.) The Discovery of Tasmania: Journal Extracts from the Expeditions
of Abel Janszoon Tasman and Marc-Joseph Marion Dufresne 1642 & 1772, St David’s Park
Publishing/Tasmanian Government Printing Office, Hobart, 1992, pp. 106, ISBN 0 7246 2241 1.

Replogle Globes–Seeing a bigger picture since 1930.

Replogle globes is a unique company with a unique story.  From its humble beginning in a Chicago apartment, Replogle globes today is the world’s largest globe manufacturer.  From handcrafted masterpieces in the offices of presidents and dignitaries to classroom models that help students understand their world, Luther Replogle’s belief in the globe as a source of wonder hasn’t changed.

It was the vision of Luther Replogle in 1930, to deliver globes to an ever broader audience.  “A Globe in Every Home,” was his rallying cry.  As a school supply salesman, he took  special interest in globes, believing he could successfully market them to a broader audience.

What we see today proves him right.  What began with a hand-assembled globes sold from a Chicago apartment (his map sourced from England) grew into what you might call a global empire.  Luther Replogle facilitated the globe’s migration from the classroom to the living room.

Replogle globes is the world’s leading globe manufacturer, based in a 260,000 square foot facility near Chicago–but some things haven’t changed much since 1930.  Many of Replogle globes are still painstakingly hand-made by artisans who have spent the better part of their lives with the company.  This is very indicative of a commitment to quality, doing things the right way, and most importantly, a commitment to the globe itself.

The cartography on all Replogle globes show nations, colonies, possessions, boundary lines, and place names as officially approved by the United States Government.  Maintenance of the content of these maps requires frequent communication with the U.S. Department of State, the U.S.Board of Geographic Names, and the National Imagery and Mapping Agency.

Additionally Replogle Globes communicates with embassies of other nations in Washington D.C. and foreign consulate offices in Chicago, for help with new changes in boundaries and names.

Thanks to Replogle Globes for providing the above information.

Sabastian Cabot, (1474? - 1557?) Explorer, Cartographer and Navigator during the age of discovery.  During his life Sabastian Cabot was employed by England and Spain to find the Northwest Passage and a way to China.

By 1512 Sebastian was employed by Henry VIII as a cartographer at Greenwich.

About 1525, he received the rank of captain general from Spain.  He began a trip with four ships and 200 men around the world (1526-1529) that was supposed to sail to China and the
Moluccas (the Spice Islands, in Indonesia).  Upon landing in Brazil, however, rumors of the wealth of the Incan king and the nearly-successful expedition of Aleixo Garcia caused Cabot to abandon his charge and instead further explore the interior of the Río de la Plata (a river between Argentina and Uruguay in South America).

All that remains of his personal work, (the account he wrote of his journeys has been lost), is a map of the new world drawn in 1544; one copy of this was found in Bavaria, and is still preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, where it still remains.

Present day world globes and maps have a rich history of courage exhibited by explorers like Sebastian Cabot.

When many people think of globes they imagine the cheap, light-blue variety often found in elementary school maps and globes classes. It’s easy to understand why people wouldn’t want to include globes of this type in their home décor. Many people prefer more elegant and expensive knick knacks.Despite their often plain appearance globes can be useful in a home. When you’re reading a newspaper article that mentions a foreign country unfamiliar to you for example, you may find it beneficial to look at a globe to find the location. Glass globes provide that finished exterior than many people prefer. Gleaming glass globes fit in well with most interior design schemes and give the home a “worldly” touch.

It’s pretty comical that in a country that labels itself “the super power of the world,” less than 40% of 18 to 24-year-olds can point out Iraq on a map of the Middle East. More than 30% of young Americans don’t understand time zone differences and two-thirds of this population can’t find Louisiana on a U.S. world map. Some may say Americans’ lack of geographical knowledge is due to decreased teaching of the subject in schools, while others might believe parents should be responsible for teaching their kids about the globe.It doesn’t matter which one of these opinions is true, it only matters that some type of action is taken to teach kids about the world map. Parents should give their kids the tools they need to understand world locations. Inflatable globes can make learning fun. Parents can point out world locations to kids while tossing the ball back and forth.

“Martin Waldseemüller was a German cartogrpher best known for his Universalis Cosmographia, a 12-sheet woodblock map dated 1507.  Not only was it one of the first maps to precisely chart latitude and longitude, but it also marked the first time the name “America” was used, referring to South America and honoring Amerigo Vespucci.”¹   In 1525 Waldseemüller appears to have had second thoughts about the name, in his reworking of the Ptolemy atlas, the continent is labelled simply Terra Incognita (unkown land).  But despite the revision, 1,000 copies of the world map had been distributed and the original suggestion took hold.  Four copies of the globular map survive in the form of “gores”: printed maps that were intended to be cut out and pasted onto a ball. Only one of these lies in the Americas today, residing at the James Ford Bell Library, University of Minnesota.

¹ Replogle Globes “Age of Exploration“

A gore is a segment of a three-dimensional  shape fabricated from a two-dimensional material.  Globes of the Earth were first mass produced by Gerard Mercator using a process of printing map details on 12 paper gores that were cut out then pasted to a sphere.  Also as seen below are samples of a 6 map gores. The first one is an early 1500’s map gore, the second picture is a modern digital map gore of the earth now used to make the Earthball.  

Vincenzo Coronelli, born in Venice in 1650, is regarded as one of Italy’s finest cartographers.  Coronelli was a cleric and encyclopedist with a particular interest in geography and cartography. He was author of more than 140 titles and produced several hundred maps.   As Royal Cartographer to King Louis XIV, Coronelli was granted access to the latest documentation sent from the colonies to the French Academy of Sciences.  His globe gores were produced to be assembled into spherical form and sold as complete globes, rare examples were kept aside to be published in sheet form.  Coronelli’s considerable works represented the pinnacle of geographic knowledge of the world in the late 17th century.

Cartographers and explorers worked together  in mapping out the world during the times of exploration.  Henry the Navigator (1394 – 1460),  the second son of King John I of Portugal set up a school at Sagres for sailors to learn the secrets of the ocean.  He paid for many sailing expeditions out of the Portuguese treasury.  Henry employed cartographers who created the most sophisticated maps of their time.  In 1419 he summoned Jehuda Cresques a noted cartographer to map the discoveries of his sailors.  The maps made it possible for sailors to learn from previous expeditions.

 As a fruit of Prince Henry’s work João Gonçalves Zarco, Bartolomeu Perestrelo and Tristão Vaz Teixeira rediscovered the Madeira Islands in 1420, and at Henry’s instigation Portuguese settlers colonized the islands.  In 1427, one of Henry’s navigators, probably Gonçalo Velho, discovered the Azores.  Portugal soon colonized these islands in 1430.  Gil Eanes, the commander of one of Henry’s expeditions, became the first European known to pass Cape Bojador in 1434.  This was a breakthrough as it was considered close to the end of the world, with difficult currents that did not encourage commercial enterprise.  Alvise Cadamosto was one of the sailors hired by Prince Henry to explore the Atlantic coast of Africa and he discovered several islands of the Cape Verde archipelago between 1455 and 1456.  In his first voyage, which started on March 22 1455, he visited the Madeira Islands and the Canary Islands.  On the second voyage, in 1456,  Cadamosto became the first European to reach the Cape Verde Islands.