Revision: Hammond World Almanac 2006 World Atlas

Publisher: Hammond World Atlas CorporationISBN: 0843709375

Hammond World Atlas Corporation has partnered with the successful World Almanac and Book of Facts to create an excellent and educational publication, Hammond World Almanac 2006 World Atlas.

You can probably call this Almanac the world-class cartography and data Bible with its 200 pages of facts and figures about people, ethnic groups, languages, religions, area, capital, GDP, head of state and governments. And then there are the 100 pages of TerraScape digital maps that present a three-dimensional relief of land and ocean terrain.

When I looked at the “Contents” section of the Almanac, I was delighted to see that there is a section related to map interpretation. How often have you looked at a map and have no idea what all the symbols or the map’s scales and projections mean?

In clear and precise language, the authors of this publication explain what map projections are and explore some of the most commonly used projections. They also present us with a new projection, Hammond Optimal Conformal.

For those of us unfamiliar with the term map projection, we are informed that the challenge facing cartographers is to project the curved surface of the Earth onto a flat plane. Consequently, to accomplish this feat, cartographers have developed map projections or formulas that govern this conversion of geographic data. It is possible to identify all points on the earth with the help of a geographic coordinate grid, and this grid is projected onto a flat surface.

From this starting point, we are given explanations of general principles and terms, how to flatten a sphere, selected examples of projections, conic projection, and the Hammond Optimal Conformal.

This opening section is followed by a full explanation of how to use the map section. This is where we discover how boundaries, naming fonts, map symbols, colors, labels, and map scales are determined.

Armed with all this introductory data, we are now ready to examine maps of the world starting with Europe and North Asia and then Asia, Australia and the Pacific, Africa, Antarctica, South America, and North America. At the bottom of each map there are color codes that differentiate the population of the different cities and towns. There is also a mileage scale indicated in miles or kilometers. Detailed and comparative thematic maps, tables, graphs for each continent, topography, population, land use, mineral resources and consumption are also included.

The final section or the World Almanac Section presents key facts and figures about each nation, such as its classification by population and area, major oceans, deep ocean and islands, rivers, waterfalls, continental altitudes, lakes, reservoirs, dams, highest mountains , temperatures, main languages, precipitation, population growth, energy and environment.

When examining facts and figures about a particular nation, we note that what is included are the following: topography, capital city, date of independence, type of government, who is the head of state and head of government, GDP, industries, major crops, minerals, life expectancy at birth, literacy rate, and a link to the country’s website.

This almanac is a magnificent achievement to savor and enjoy over and over again. It fills an educational niche and is a perfect complement to libraries, classrooms, and personal book collections, where vital geographic data is at your fingertips.

The above review was contributed by: NORM GOLDMAN Bookpleasures editor. CLICK TO SEE MORE OF THE Norm Goldman Reviews