Joshua Fry and Peter Jefferson. A Map of the Most Inhabited Part of Virginia containing the Whole Province of Maryland with a Part of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and North Carolina. 1775. In two sections, not joined together
A landmark
work, the Jefferson-Fry Map was "the first printed map to delineate extensively
the western interior of Maryland and Virginia and to portray adequately the
Appalachian Mountains."
It held official status in that it was ordered by the London Board of Trade.
"Virginia map-making before the Revolution turns on the
pivots of four famous maps: those of John Smith, 1608; Augustine Herman, 1670;
Fry and Jefferson, 1751; and John Henry, 1770." The Virginia section of
the most significant map of Colonial America made by John Mitchell was based
upon the Fry-Jefferson map of 1751.
Only two known copies of the first edition of this map
are known to exist. One is found in the Tracy W. McGregor Library of the
University of Virginia, and the other is held by the New York Public Library.
Dumas Malone in commenting on this situation said, "The Map of Virginia made by
Joshua Fry and Peter Jefferson over two centuries ago fully deserves
reproduction in its earliest printed state because of its intrinsic merit,
historical importance, and extreme rarity." Interest in it is also enhanced by
the relationship of one of its authors to Thomas Jefferson.