A few years ago I came across a map by Rafael Palacios in a bookstore. Over time I found more and more of them and got caught up in what I then saw as a mystery. As it turns out, Palacios was one of the most prolific mapmakers of the 20th century and many people have Palacios maps in their libraries without realizing it. His story is an amazing one, and I have become convinced he was something of a genius: a self-taught artist from Puerto Rico who was a talented painter, a skilled historian, and a cartographer who published something close to 5000 unique maps in his career. He was also a master of bringing maps to life with hand-lettered labels and understood how to distill a map to its essence.
I have finished a first draft of a long article on Palacios and look forward to publishing something soon to get his story on the record. A few samples of his style below:
