Austin From Above: The Bird's Eye Views of Augustus Koch

[TexasTowelie]

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1873 bird's eye view of Austin by Augustus Koch

Among any city’s top tourist attractions are the views from above. A first-time visitor to New York will find time for a trip to the observation deck of the Empire State Building. Paris boasts the Eiffel Tower and London the London Eye.

But it wasn't always so. Before airplanes and skyscrapers came along in the early 20th century, aerial views remained in the imagination (or, for the lucky few, in the basket of a hot air balloon).

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1887 bird's eye view of Austin by Augustus Koch

Prussian immigrant Augustus Koch strove to change this. Not by erecting large buildings or inventing an airship, but by drafting accurate city views from the sky. Koch wasn't the only artist producing these bird’s eye views, but he was prolific and traveled widely, and fortunately for any 21st-century Austinite interested in exploring the city’s past, he drafted maps of Austin in 1873 and in 1887.

If you look closely at these maps, you can see some fascinating details about how life in our city was different in its early years.

More great images and current photos of the various buildings in Austin at http://www.austinpost.org/austin-history/austin-above-birds-eye-views-augustus-koch .

[kentauros]

1. Those are cool maps,

and I know I've seen one for Houston that shows the city limits stopping just outside of Rice University!

So, if you want to look at more historical maps of Texas, try the Perry-Castañeda Library - Map Collection. They also have links on that page to other sites, including the Amon Carter Museum's "Texas Birds-Eye Views" page