Frank Jacobs

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Frank Jacobs

Journalist, writer, and blogger

strange maps

Frank Jacobs is Big Think's "Strange Maps" columnist.

From a young age, Frank was fascinated by maps and atlases, and the stories they contained. Finding his birthplace on the map in the endpapers of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings only increased his interest in the mystery and message of maps.

While pursuing a career in journalism, Frank started a blog called Strange Maps, as a repository for the weird and wonderful cartography he found hidden in books, posing as everyday objects and (of course) floating around the Internet.

"Each map tells a story, but the stories told by your standard atlas for school or reference are limited and literal: they show only the most practical side of the world, its geography and its political divisions. Strange Maps aims to collect and comment on maps that do everything but that - maps that show the world from a different angle".

A remit that wide allows for a steady, varied diet of maps: Frank has been writing about strange maps since 2006, published a book on the subject in 2009 and joined Big Think in 2010. Readers send in new material daily, and he keeps bumping in to cartography that is delightfully obscure, amazingly beautiful, shockingly partisan, and more.

Everything Videos Articles
Four maps of Ireland from 1800, 1850, 1900, and 2000 show a steady decline in areas where Irish is spoken natively, marked in green, nearly disappearing by 2000.
Strange Maps
The Irish language is having a moment — and running out of time
Gaeilge is trending culturally. So why is it, according to census data, also dying?
Frank Jacobs
World map showing global oil reserves, rare earth elements deposits (yellow dots), and major shipping routes and chokepoints, with oil reserves highlighted by pink circles of varying sizes.
Strange Maps
The Strait of Hormuz is today’s energy chokepoint. China is tomorrow’s.
As the global economy moves beyond oil, the strategic importance of the world’s most critical hydrocarbon chokepoint is likely to decline rapidly.
Frank Jacobs
A map of the United States showing the most popular paint color in each state, with names of various gray, blue, and neutral shades labeled over the corresponding states.
Strange Maps
How the modern world turned gray (and why color may be coming back)
The ideology, economics, and psychology behind the modern world's draining of color from homes, cars, and everyday objects.
Frank Jacobs
Historic map illustration of the city of Tenochtitlan, surrounded by water, with labeled features and detailed buildings, from the early colonial period in Mexico.
Strange Maps
Ghost map: Europe’s first glimpse of Tenochtitlan shows a city already destroyed
This 1524 map of the Aztec capital was a window into an exotic otherworld — and largely a fiction.
Frank Jacobs
A group of people stands and plays cricket in an urban park at dusk, with city buildings, trees, and illuminated streetlights in the background.
Strange Maps
We saved the world once — we can do it again
The ozone hole was going to destroy life as we know it, but an unprecedented global effort fixed the problem.
Frank Jacobs
Historic map illustration of a star-shaped fortified city with surrounding moat, labeled roads, and buildings visible outside the city walls.
Strange Maps
Militarized snowflakes: The accidental beauty of Renaissance star forts
First rising in the 15th century, these forts sought to counter a deadly innovation in military technology.
Frank Jacobs
A section of a map labeled "West McKinley Town Site" with surrounding property names and numbers in blue and orange text.
Strange Maps
Welcome to McKinley: How the U.S. almost colonized a chunk of Cuba
A century ago, an American colony named after Trump's favorite president was thriving on the Isle of Pines. Then came hurricanes and geopolitical reality.
Frank Jacobs
A person stands next to a large book titled "The Knowledge," symbolizing mastery of the city’s map.
Strange Maps
Memorizing London’s 25,000 streets changes cabbies’ brains — and may prevent Alzheimer’s
One of the toughest vocational exams in the world requires candidates to memorize 25,000 streets in an area five times the size of Manhattan.
Frank Jacobs
3D topographic map showing underwater reefs and features labeled with names such as Toul ar Fot, TAF1, Porz Biazel, and Ar Fot Bras; scale and north arrow included.
Strange Maps
7,000-year-old underwater wall raises questions about ancient engineering — and lost-city legends
Scientists found a massive underwater wall off the coast of France that might help explain the origin of the legend of Ys.
Frank Jacobs
A colorful map of the United States with state boundaries replaced by regions labeled with various unrelated names and entities.
Strange Maps
America’s post-apocalyptic maps reveal eerily familiar fault lines
In post-apocalyptic fiction, imagined futures turn today’s political and cultural tensions into geography.
Frank Jacobs
A color-coded map of Asia shows four migration phases from China, with arrows pointing toward Papua New Guinea and the Andaman Islands, both circled in yellow.
Strange Maps
“The Chinese Job”: Spain’s wild 1580s plan to conquer the world — via Beijing
The plan — conquer China and push west to attack the Ottomans — was peak imperial hubris, as the Spanish themselves eventually realized.
Frank Jacobs
A raised hand with bracelets is shown in focus against a blurred background of people indoors.
Strange Maps
Mapped: If America were 100 people, this is what they’d believe
Nearly 30 would be "nones" — an amorphous group that spans from zealous atheists to the vaguely spiritual.
Frank Jacobs
A world map comparing landmass outlines of the Equal Earth projection in pink and Mercator projection in green, with grid lines overlaid.
Strange Maps
Africa wants its true size on the world map
The African Union argues that the Mercator projection distorts the continent, both in size and global attention.
Frank Jacobs
Illustrated map showing streets, parks, and landmarks of a coastal city bordered by Hob's River and Delaware Bay, with a compass rose in the lower right corner.
Strange Maps
The strange cartography of Superman’s ever-shifting hometown
The latest "Superman" film sets Metropolis in the First State.
Frank Jacobs
Diagram showing a galaxy, zooming in to highlight a small area labeled "Human Experience" within a grid mapping time and space on logarithmic scales.
Strange Maps
Mapped: The boundaries of human perception
Science helps us imagine the vastness of space and time — and our small but meaningful place within it.
Frank Jacobs
Map showing Copenhagen, Denmark’s projected 2080 climate as similar to Demigny, France today, with a red arrow connecting the two cities and climate details listed in pop-up boxes.
Strange Maps
Mapped: How warm your city will be in the 2080s
“Climate analog mapping” finds the place that is currently as warm as your city might be in 60 years.
Frank Jacobs
Granite memorial stone for John F. Kennedy, surrounded by trees and located on a paved area with steps. Inscription dedicates the site from the people of Britain to the United States.
Strange Maps
Is this acre in England really American territory?
The JFK Memorial at Runnymede provides a link between America's and Britain's founding documents.
Frank Jacobs
Diagram showing human evolutionary relationships and gene flow among Khoisan, West Africans, Non-Africans, Neanderthals, and Denisovans over time, with percentages of genetic admixture indicated.
Strange Maps
Evolution isn’t a straight line: Modern humans come from 2 ancient lineages
After more than a million years of separation, two branches of humanity reunited around 300,000 years ago, suggests new research.
Frank Jacobs
Map of Bhutan showing its borders with China and India, highlighting several disputed regions with labels indicating their names and locations.
Strange Maps
Why China is eating its tiny neighbor, Bhutan
As Beijing encroaches on the territory of the Himalayan kingdom, its ultimate aim is leverage over India.
Frank Jacobs
Map showing income per capita in 1300 (US dollars, 1990 PPP) across Europe, the Middle East, North Africa, and Asia, with regions shaded by income brackets.
Strange Maps
Ancient China was less equal than the Roman Empire. Here’s why.
A comparison of wealth gaps in ancient empires reveals stark differences and lasting consequences.
Frank Jacobs
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