Frank Jacobs

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Frank Jacobs

Journalist, writer, and blogger

strange maps

Frank Jacobs is Big Think's "Strange Maps" columnist.

From a young age, Frank was fascinated by maps and atlases, and the stories they contained. Finding his birthplace on the map in the endpapers of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings only increased his interest in the mystery and message of maps.

While pursuing a career in journalism, Frank started a blog called Strange Maps, as a repository for the weird and wonderful cartography he found hidden in books, posing as everyday objects and (of course) floating around the Internet.

"Each map tells a story, but the stories told by your standard atlas for school or reference are limited and literal: they show only the most practical side of the world, its geography and its political divisions. Strange Maps aims to collect and comment on maps that do everything but that - maps that show the world from a different angle".

A remit that wide allows for a steady, varied diet of maps: Frank has been writing about strange maps since 2006, published a book on the subject in 2009 and joined Big Think in 2010. Readers send in new material daily, and he keeps bumping in to cartography that is delightfully obscure, amazingly beautiful, shockingly partisan, and more.

Everything Videos Articles
europe digital divide
Strange Maps
Europe’s stunning digital divide, in one map
Some Europeans really don't want to use the internet.
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
Colorado is not a rectangle — it has 697 sides
The Centennial State is technically a hexahectaenneacontakaiheptagon.
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
The great European house cat migration
Ancient bones reveal that domesticated felines were at home in Pre-Neolithic Poland around 8,000 years ago.
Frank Jacobs
maps stamps
Strange Maps
What’s better than maps or stamps? Maps on stamps!
When maps meet stamps, you get a love child called "cartophilately."
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
The Viking woman who sailed to America and walked to Rome
The amazing life of “Gudrid the Far-Traveled” was unjustly overshadowed by her in-laws, Erik the Red and Leif Erikson.
Frank Jacobs
sleep duration
Strange Maps
Want to sleep longer? Move to Albania
If you want to sleep more, try working less, eating better, and exercising more. Alternatively, you could emigrate to Albania.
Frank Jacobs
place of poetry
Strange Maps
An interactive map with bizarre poems about England
Is the dumpster in the alley worthy of a poem?
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
How Atlantic City inspired the Monopoly board
The popular game has a backstory rife with segregation, inequality, intellectual theft, and outlandish political theories.
Frank Jacobs
inflation
Strange Maps
It could be worse: 5 countries have triple-digit inflation
Guess which country has 269% inflation.
Frank Jacobs
Christianity england
Strange Maps
Christianity’s retreat from England, mapped
For the first time in nearly 1500 years, fewer than half the people in England and Wales consider themselves Christian.
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
The world map of the future might be vertical
A vertical map might better represent a world dominated by China and determined by shipping routes across the iceless Arctic.
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
Roman roads are still connecting Europe’s wealthiest areas
All roads may not lead to Rome, but many of them lead to wealth and prosperity — even 1,500 years after the fall of the Roman Empire.
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
In 1882, a man wrongly drew a map. His mistake saved a forest of 300-year-old trees.
A 19th-century surveying mistake kept lumberjacks away from what is now Minnesota's largest patch of old-growth trees.
Frank Jacobs
soccer
Strange Maps
World soccer explained in 10 maps
These ten maps provide a fascinating insight into the impact that soccer (sorry, football) has had worldwide.
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
Newton’s apple tree has descendants and clones all over the world
Its apples taste bad, but institutions all over the world want a descendant or clone of the tree, anyway.
Frank Jacobs
triple alignment
Strange Maps
The “triple alignment” makes world mapping history
True north, magnetic north, and grid north have aligned. There's also a connection to James Bond.
Frank Jacobs
flight shame
Strange Maps
“Flight shame”: Not even Europe’s famous rail network can replace airplanes
Environmental activists want us to feel "flight shame" if we can take a train, instead. But this isn't entirely realistic, even in Europe.
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
Amazing Amasia: a new take on the next supercontinent
One possible vision of the distant future.
Frank Jacobs
Strange Maps
This map solves a century-old mystery about eels
All American and European eels originate in the same place.
Frank Jacobs
8 billion
Strange Maps
Global population will hit 8 billion on November 15, but it will begin shrinking around 2100
Humanity is poised to pass the 8 billion milestone mid-November, but population growth is actually slowing down.
Frank Jacobs
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