My father, Ian Mumford, who has died aged 90, made a large contribution to our understanding of the history of the Ordnance Survey and of mapmaking in general, as a founder and first honorary secretary of the British Cartographic Society, as author of several chapters of the official history of the Ordnance Survey, and as a leading member of the Charles Close Society for the study of OS maps.
Ian worked to help people understand that there is more to maps than the lines on the page – especially with the move towards computerised map indexes and digital cartography. He made the interactive presentation Map as Artefact, in which he encouraged the audience to understand how varied maps could be, and how important information could be written on the back, as well as printed on the front.
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