1928 Jo Mora Pictorial Map of San Diego, California

This is a 1928 Jo Mora pictorial map of San Diego, California. With San Diego at its center, the map depicts the California coast from La Jolla to Tijuana. Described by Mora as a 'whimsical map and history of a city in California', comical vignettes abound. Mora, as is his style, effortlessly blends the humor with a celebration of the city and The Marston Company, a department store in San Diego whose founder commissioned the map to commemorate the store's Golden Anniversary. Sites around the area, including several army forts, the Naval Air Station, Balboa Park, the zoo, the San Diego De Alcala Mission, and the Point Loma Lighthouse are illustrated. Mission Beach, Pacific Beach, and La Jolla are all labeled, as well as Soledad Mountain, La Mesa Reservoir, Sweetwater Reservoir, and Mt. Helix. Some of the more comic vignettes include a salesman trying to sell land in a subdivision to a young couple, one of which is holding a bag marked 'Iowa', a man running from a swarm of bees, and a drunk using the sign marking Mexico to hold himself up.

Four insets in the lower right corner highlight buildings around San Diego, while others are illustrated in the lower left corner, along with hilarious portraits of seven different 'savage and ferocious beasts of the forest and mountain to be seen at Balboa Park'. A cartouche in the upper right corner is dedicated to celebrating The Marston Company and features full-length portraits of women modeling the evolution of ladies' fashion. Views of all four Marston Company stores are included as well. The whole is surrounded by a border made up of vignettes commemorating San Diego's history from the discovery of San Diego Bay by Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, to whom this map is dedicated, to the founding of Spanish missions, to the battles of the Mexican-American War which led to the founding of modern-day San Diego. The arrival of the railroads and the Navy are highlighted as well.

Publication History and Census

This map was created by Jo Mora after he was commissioned by George Marston, the founder of Marston's Department Store, to commemorate the chain's Golden Anniversary. Only 2,000 copies of this work were every printed as commemorative gifts, afterward the plates were destroyed, per George Marston's wishes. Two copies are catalogued in the OCLC as being part of the institutional collections at the Denver Public Library and the University of California, San Diego. Another example is part of the David Rumsey Map Collection. It occasionally appears on the private market.