MAP WITHOUT A FLAW

Evening Star, Issue 20312, 22 October 1929, Page 3

MAP WITHOUT A FLAW

SCHOOL CHILDREN'S WORK School children of Northamptonshire have put 585,000 acres of their county on the map. The -work occupied just over a year, and a considerable portion of it was done in their own time. Once they got going, the juvenile carto graphers could not bo restrained. Their task was to produce a land utilisation survey map—the first in the country—and it is the authoritative opinion of Mr E. E. Field, F.R.G.S., that they have produced a map that will survive the most exacting test. Scholars from 200 schools took part Working in classes, or groups, they surveyed 305 parishes, involving the examination of thousands of fields. One of the earliest discoveries they made was that the 1901 ordnance survey maps were wrong in several particulars. The necessary alterations were made on the spot, the pupils putting symbols on the traced copies of the maps they carried with them. Later, back at school, they filled in details shading in water colours, light green for grassland, dark green for woods, brown for cultivated land. Measurements were taken and corrections made, Sometimes, as, for instance, when working on large parishes like Bragstock, with 6,000 odd acres, aTid Biacklcy, with 3,500 acres, it was necessary to' stick at _ the work long after school hours. The scholars did it joyfully. Now the children have the satisfaction of knowing that their enthusiasm has been so well spent that the minutest checking by the experts has failed to discover a flaw. They have produced a perfect land ■ utilisation survey. They worked on 6iu maps. Those were "reduced to a one-inch scale, and dually printed for general use. Every school which took part, in the survey' has been; presented with sets of the map, which is published in three sections. These arc to he hung m a prominent place, as a permanent record of a unique achievement. None of the cartographers was older than fourteen.