Swenningsen, Jack (sold)
Jack Swenningsen (1916 - June 3, 2017) was a Danish-American photographer, graphic artist, and accordionist, based in St. Petersburg, Florida. He was born in Denmark and immigrated to the United States as a young child. He grew up in New York City, graduating from Pratt with a degree in advertising and marrying Amelia Swenningsen shortly before World War II. During the war he served in the U.S. Army Infantry with whom he was stationed in northeastern Italy. Swenningsen and his family relocated to St. Petersburg Florida in 1948, immediately falling in love with the state. He is the designer of the 'Mer Sun" photo on the St. Petersburg Chamber of Commerce building. Swenningson died at the extreme old age of 102 in 2017. We are aware of only 1 map by Swenningsen, his pictorial map of the United States as seen by a Floridian.
Charming pictorial map exaggerating Florida!
A United States Map as the Floridian Sees It.
sold
- Digital Map Information
- Suitable for large format printing
- File Size: 12.7 MB
- File Type: ZIP / TIFF
- ICC color profile embedded
- Delivered instantly via download link
A humorous 1948 Jack Swenningsen map of the United States as seen from the perspective of a Floridian. No doubt inspired by Daniel K. Wallingford's c. 1930s maps, A Yorker's Idea … and A Bostonian's Idea…, this map presents an outsized Florida and pokes fun at provincial Floridian ideas about California, Canadas, Alaska, and he Midwest. Here Florida covers the entire Eastern portion of the United States. The Mason-Dixon Line divides not the North and the South, but the United States and Canada, known only for its signature soda, 'Canada Dry.'. The author plays with the connect between New York and Long Island and Florida, suggesting that it is just an easy 100 miles away. It also suggests that all roads to Florida are 'one way.' California, Alaska, Texas, and the mid-west are presented as a freezing wasteland. Florida itself is filled with all of the joys of the good life: sunshine, bathing beauties, oranges, Yankee Stadium, glamor, and of course, fishing. (more details)