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signalnoise

Oak Park, IL

Member Since 2004

Followers 129 Following 336

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Wednesday Mar 21, 2007

Mar 21, 2007
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Fear the update!



That's a map I made yesterday. It's Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina in 1860, and it shows population density by county. Laid over that is a layer representing the major railroads in the region at the time, color coded by both time period constructed *and* funding mechanism (private, state, or city supported). It was built from publicly available census data and ArcGIS. Today I ran a slick little logit which told me that, at the national level in 1860, counties with railroads were unlikely to also have water access (not that surprising). It was even statistically significant. It's actually a nice little model, but I have some worries about causation (did railroads lead to population growth, or do populous places get railroads??).

This is what I do all day.
VIEW 9 of 9 COMMENTS
toothpickmoe:
Interesting. I'm sure you have far more experience reading historical texts at this point, but one of my favorite things about history are the stories of how and why. I imagine you're spending a lot more time with the dry, statsical-based histories and I'm thinking more of the andecdotal ones. Plus, there is a level of science involved in the way you're approaching this and that is surely beyond my personal experience with history as a whole. Nonetheless, you've made (or are making) something that could be construed as pretty boring stuff (numbers) interesting. smile

And everyone loves colorful maps. wink
Mar 23, 2007
toothpickmoe:
Hear you loud and clear, on all fronts. That's why you do what you do and historians do what they do. Two different things.

So, how many people ask you if you're becoming a master of Social Studies? Do you remember that class?
Mar 23, 2007

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