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subspaceteatime — The Two Americas
#america #map #cartography #unitedstates #mapsandflags
Published: 2017-05-27 00:30:46 +0000 UTC; Views: 26932; Favourites: 261; Downloads: 273
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Description
A map made for a project I'm working on. This project examines the American obsession with the Civil War--as well as the myth of the antebellum Dixie perpetuated in film, television, novels, and other media--and myths about the Confederate States of America through the lens of alternate history.It is a story that examines the existence of two Americas, deeply divided against each other. Here we have the United States ("the North" and "the Union") with its massive industrialized cities choking with smog, poverty, and institutional oppression of immigrants and racial minorities yet also its hopeful looks toward the future with the many people who fight passionately for the rights of women, African-Americans, immigrants, socialists, populists, and more that helped transform the United States into practically two different countries in our own world--and here examined in a way to see what would have happened had that entire beast not been tied to the Jim Crow South.
We also have the Confederate States of America ("the South" and "Dixie"), subject of uncountable volumes of real and alternate history, with its repressive and regressive systems based in slavery, racial prejudice, oppression, extreme gaps in wealth, and poverty. It is a land unstable to the point of collapse at any given time and, indeed, in this world by 1900 it is on the edge of a revolution rivaling those in Russia and China in our own world. In real life, the Confederacy was dissolved but its legacy clung on for well over a century and, in many ways, still does to this day.
This project, thus, will look at a conceptual view of history in which the two vastly different parts of our own United States take different paths, and what the results would be; and hopefully along the way debunk some of the worst myths surrounding the Confederacy still held today by white supremacists and other evil persons.
I hope you enjoy the map and hope you will further enjoy the writing itself, which will accompany this map shortly.
If you enjoyed this map and want to support me (and get some bonus goodies), donate to my Patreon: www.patreon.com/toixstory
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Comments: 129
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I really like this map! It has a nice period look. I do wish you had made one of the historic situation and railroads in 1860. A couple of things (which you have probably already considered) "Oklahoma" was not a state until November 1907. It was "Indian Territory" from 1830. The tribes were mostly pro-CSA as they were slave owners. White settlers were officially permitted in 1887 by the Dawes Act and the "Land Rush " was in 1889.
West Virginia "Seceded" from Virginia in 1862 and became a new Union State in 1863. The western and northern counties always had issue with the wealthier tide-water areas. The local pro-Union militias with Federal troops drove out the CSA authorities. West Virginia regiments fought with the Union Army of the Potomac throughout the war including Gettysburg. Interestingly the area first used the names Kanawha and Loyal Virginia. WHY? The Appalachia Mountain area was not conductive to enterprise requiring slaves. (stoop labor for agriculture especially Cotton and Tobacco) The Appalachians run from Pennsylvania to Georgia and with few slave owners tended to be pro-Union. The population was poor but self sufficient in lumber and mining and many were Scot and Welsh immigrants. The other Pro-union areas were Eastern Tenn. and Western No. Carolina. Areas that also provided soldiers for the Union army. MONTANI SEMPER LIBERI !
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Can I translate this map to russian for my collection?
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Thanks!
here is
author.today/reader/34476
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Thank you very much!
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As a history major, I find the worship of the Confederacy to be utterly repulsive.
I too wonder what the Northern US would be like if the CSA had broken away. My fantasy is that it would have become a social democratic state like Canada, without the hardcore conservatism of the CSA.
But I struggle to remember that people in the North were just as racist as those in the South (would the alternate US be welcoming of freed slaves, for example).
The idea of the 20th Confederacy being like Tsarist Russia is plausible. And a collapse of the state due to revolution would be very plausible.
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I suppose one reason people are curious about the Civil War period is that it was the largest conflict until WW1 or 2 regards the destruction it caused. North & South interfered with habeas corpus, both introduced conscription, both tinkered with the economy introducing fiat money and taking control of companies like the various railway and other means of transport.
Every time I've read one of these Alt-Hists I feel they fall down when describing what would happen afterward cause it's not going to be like Gone With The Wind with a happy ending.
The plantocracy would probably stifle political change for it's own convenience, international diplomatic pressure would make things difficult for the Rebel republic, I've read about the Red Shirts and their interference in elections - the local elites were apparently quite content to shit on the rule of law when it was convenient for them as they did in the Hamburg Massacre.
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Such a division would certainly have had repercussions for the rest of the world. For example, if a divided US had been unable to intervene effectively in World War I, would Germany have won and become Europe's dominant power? Would the truncated North still have become a global power in the 20th century, or would it be too preoccupied with its confrontation with the Confederacy, leaving Germany and Russia as the dominant powers? If slavery or something like apartheid survived in the Confederacy down to today, would it be a global pariah like South Africa in the apartheid era, or would the global rejection of white supremacy have been slowed down, leaving such states still respectable? (I know all those events are later than 1900, but obviously the history would have continued to diverge.)
I notice your map doesn't include Alaska or Hawaii. If the Civil War started earlier, presumably the US never acquired them, even by 1900.
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Not a chance, The US may have been the final nail the the German's Coffin, but in no way were they the hammer
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I saw the title, thought it was a reference to the continents.
(1 of 2)
(2 of 2)
Your ideology is however very noble.
Also, I see that the state of Kansas got the part of Oklahoma referred to historically as "No Man's Land," "Cimarron Territory" or "The Panhandle." The "Neutral Zone" within the parallels 36˚30´ N to 37˚ N and between 100˚ W and 103˚ W.
If Mackenzie is what is in our timeline Alberta (Canada's answer to the southeastern USA I hear) primarily, and The part of the NWT that was administered as "The District of MacKenzie" for over a century starting in 1895 from 60˚ N to the Beaufort Sea, does that mean MacKenzie here also extends that far, stops where Athabaska began from 1882 to 1894 or does it stop at 60 North as it did after 1894?
Assiniboia survived after 1905 it looks like. Manitoba got a greater share of the border region.
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Thank you for the compliments!
I do realize that my unfortunate Americentric worldview did have me making a title like that without realizing that people would probably take it a different way. Ah well. I can always make another map of the same title featuring all of the Americas, eh?
With Mackenzie, the area stops at 60 north and the rest is simply renamed, I was thinking. It's not quite so crazy that way, haha. And yes, Assiniboia survives while Manitoba is enlarged. I just strove to create a different Canada since I feel in many worlds like this Canada is mostly ignored in favor of the United States.
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You are welcome!
It would be cool if you did.
That makes sense.
Thank you for your time.
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Ok... Questions!
First of all... What do you use to add the "grainy" texture to your maps, and if you use photoshop textures, what specific texture?
How did you add the stripes on the water?
Assuming you are using inkscape how did you add roads/railroads that are 2 lines next to each other.
I have just started making maps and looking for ways to make mine look better.
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Sorry for taking so long! Been caught up but kept this to answer.
1. I did the grainy texture by taking a texture available on deviantart for free by artists who give them out and putting it over with a "multiply" effect and reduced opacity.
2. For the water I had a fill on the water and then I took a bunch of stripes, overlayed them, and put that layer above the water but below the rest of the map.
3. For the rail lines I drew out the larger segments and then, in Inkscape, instantly copy-pasted them with Ctrl+D and then reduced the size and changed the color, which makes them appear "inside" the line below.
Hope this helps! Sorry for taking forever to respond. D:
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Thanks! Your maps are amazing. This is really useful info and defitienly makes the maps look a lot more authentic. I will be and have been using this advice!
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What are the militaries of the two Americas like? How do they plan to fight Round 2?
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The United States has a rather large military, one of the largest in the world compared to our world where it was never very large. As a result, the CSA has a serious army but they don't really plan to use it, and the USA hopes they don't have to. Because Round 2 is basically a given: the United States will win, but it will be insanely expensive and devastating and when they win they either can take border areas and set up further conflict down the road, annex the entire nation and get a massive guerrilla war, or return to the status quo a bit poorer and bloodier. No one really wants it and so far, to quote the film War Games: "The only winning move is not to play."
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So did the US move its capital D.C is looking pretty precarious with Confederate artillery right across the Potomac
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Yes, if you notice Chicago has become the US capital in this world. It was moved for precisely those reasons, and Chicago chosen as a kind of grand "London of the United States" that also had a lot of connections to the country's waterways via the Great Lakes and canals while also not having the old monied elite or corruption so rife in New York City and, to a lesser extent, Philadelphia. Not to mention Chicago is a good rail center and connects the two big sides of the country. So yes, the US moves its capital well inland to Chicago while Washington is formally annexed into the state of Maryland with a few special agreements.
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huh avoiding the trope of Philly how does it work is there a federal district right in the middle or what?
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Yeah I'm not as much a fan of the ol' Philadelphia thing especially after the Civil War when the US is going to be much more centralized and wanting a capital that reflects its increased focus on the Midwest. There is not a federal district as large as DC but rather a setup where a specific district within Chicago is separate from the city and in use by the federal government, containing the Presidential Manor, Houses of Congress, SCOTUS, and so on. This also removes the tricky issue of voting rights and such for the capital when it's pretty much just the offices of government and some living areas for politicians.
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Ahhhh, have you ever seen a sexier natural harbor than the San Francisco Bay?
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I'm glad you like it
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so what was the peace deal the US got Kentucky, in exchange for West Virginia?
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Well since the war went off at a different time in this world, in the late 1850s instead, West Virginia didn't have the votes to secede. Though yes there was considerable support there and in Eastern Tennessee for the Union and at times the Union occupied the area, so Kentucky was a trade. The US was willing to let West Virginia and Eastern Tennessee go, but could not afford to have the CSA all the way up to the banks of the Ohio.
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So what deal did the US negotiate for access to the Missipi river?
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The US had recently won battles to secure a good chunk of Kentucky plus plunge deep down the Mississippi towards Memphis as well as had taken New Orleans and some of the barrier islands of the Carolinas and Georgia. This would also lead to the argument that the US could have won the war. While that's a debate, what did happen is that the US was able to negotiate for the borders we currently see.
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Well, that's flash point number 1 right there the US will not tolerate New Orleans being in foreign hands unless they can get those navigation rights. There's also the fact of debates over flood control. Imagine if, in a time of bad relations between the US and Confederacy, the Mississippi rises, and the Confederacy (CSA businessmen, planters, etc.) decide to blow the levees upstream in Missouri, Kentucky or Ohio to release the tension on their levees new war and the USA wins get control of the Missipi back. Bad treaties make for interesting stories
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My word...still, I suppose it'll be interesting to see how it works out. I look forward to seeing more!
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You're very welcome!
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Enjoyed your work until I read the description. You know while you brow beat the Confederacy the US committed far more crimes on this planet then the CSA ever did. Do you want to talk the protection of state slavery as a result of the 13th Amendment? We are led to believe that the war was over freeing the slaves; but in actual reality it just monopolized slavery in the hands on the State. To this day the US has the highest incarnation rate in the world, most of them people of color.
We can talk about the crimes it has committed against the Native Americans too. While the "5 Civilized Tribes" signed formal treaties with the Confederacy the US went on a campaign of terror and extermination against the Navajo and Sioux. Ever heard of the Sand Creek massacre or the Great Long Walk? All in all I suggest you do your proper research before any form of hypocrisy reveals itself.
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Yeah...you realize you can hate both, right? I'm pretty firmly against America's capitalist and imperialist state that oppresses people of color and LGBT people at home and abroad through constant warfare, funding of reactionary armies and states, oppression through legal slavery in the 13th amendment and the War on Drugs that has effectively sought to re-enslave people of color through the corrupt and broken judicial system, the use of police as thugs and attack dogs who are able to legally kill people of color, particularly black Americans, and get away with it, no-knock raids essentially designed to get someone killed or incarcerated for life, the horrible treatment of Native Americans through broken treaties, campaigns of genocide against innocent peoples (including the Dakota Wars leading to the 38+1 execution while the Civil War took place) and forcing them into poverty and maltreatment on tiny reservations with fewer rights (including lack of citizenship until 1924), using tribal lands illegally for things like the DAPL, and so on. I could go on literally for hours, and that's not even touching the brutality against LGBT people, lack of worker's rights and protections, a refusal to try and treat the opiod epidemic throughout the Midwest, etc. I am not a fan of the United States.
However, that does not absolve the CSA from its sins. While I do cover the nuances of the subject in this project (for example, the 5 Civilized Tribes secede with the Confederacy in this world not quite because they're in love with the CSA but because they hate the USA that has brutalized them, killed them, forced them off their land, and then raped that land and their people and culture), I am also upfront with how the CSA itself was founded on the principle of protecting the upper classes from having their system of feudalism and slavery stripped away from them that kept millions of people of color in bondage in the cruelest and most inhuman of ways and in such large numbers that the money they had invested in slavery and slaves was greater than all the money in industry in the North (though that does not absolve New York City from greatly profiting off that money in slavery; neither side is free of sin). The fundamental idea of the Confederacy was to create a state for the survival and proliferation of slavery and white supremacy through keeping black people in a perpetual state of bondage from which they could not escape and the rest of the population in a feudal system of oppression and poverty for all but the richest and most powerful.
The project itself seeks to examine, in full, the differences between parts of today's United States and how they would be if they were separate nations from each other rather than united in what is at times an uneasy alliance. It does not shy away from showing the sins of the North as much as the South, and also seeks to examine some solutions to the situations that both sides find themselves in, in parallel to solutions suggested for our modern problems in this country. I am myself from the South, having lived all but a few years of my life here (and am living in Georgia currently), so it's not as if I am speaking from an outsider's point of view, but from a place I know very well and have studied at length.
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Hi, Toix!
I just wanted to stop by and say that this is a cool map, and I can't wait to see Heart of Dixie make a comeback!
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Who are the current presidents of the US and CS as of 1900?
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I will tell you when I figure it out for myself, haha
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Awesome Alternate History work !
So; how's life on Confederacy as a native american or black person ? Unexpectedly decent or mildly uncomfortable ?
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Thank you! And given that it's the Confederacy in 1900, it's not great for a black person. Even with the end of slavery more or less there are many systems and institutions built on white supremacy that need to be (and will be) torn down. For Native Americans it's complicated, as they seceded from the US due to a hatred of the US' policies toward Native Americans and the hopes that the more states' rights Confederacy would allow them to better manage their own affairs. Inside Oklahoma they are fairly well off, all things considered, but in the rest of the country racism and prejudice is still strong, unfortunately.
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You're Very Welcome ! Great works
Understood, thanks for the explaination !
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So with Alberta and Assiniboia, are these still districts of the Northwest Territories like OTL 1900 or are they full fledged provinces? Great map btw!
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I was thinking that with Canada becoming a kingdom they're more willing to let territories become full-fledged provinces so by 1900 Alberta and Assiniboia are both provinces. And thank you!
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No problem! Thanks for the response
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I love the style you did with the map and your outline of the scenario! It seems much more realistic and believable compared with countless other scenarios found throughout the Internet.
One question though, why is Canada called a kingdom here? Perhaps the Constitution act proceeded differently?
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I'm glad you like it! I've researched the subject pretty extensively so I've tried to make a more realistic and lived-in scenario for the future project. 
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