The most impressive Providence maps are those produced for the insurance industry. Between 1889 and 1950, the Sanborn Map Co. of New York City completed a series of incredibly detailed maps of every building in the city for the insurance and real-estate industries. Brown has a complete set of the Sanborn maps on file at the John Hay Library, which houses the university’s rare and special collections.

“The Sanborn maps covered every building every 10 years,” said [Howard] Stone [the Brown map cataloguer].

Now that would make a great animation.