{"product_id":"old-city-plan-map-of-charleston-sc-by-keenan-1844-meeting-king-sts-vendue-range-sc-rr-depot-80-bldgs-8-fire-wells","title":"Old City Plan Map of Charleston SC by Keenan, 1844: Meeting \u0026 King Sts, Vendue Range, SC RR depot, 80 bldgs, 8 fire wells","description":"\u003cp\u003ePlan of the City Neck of Charleston, S.C., issued in September 1844, presents a scarce and incisive portrait of the peninsula poised between the Ashley and Cooper Rivers at the height of the antebellum era. The plan’s measured geometry clarifies the city’s growth along a coastal corridor that had long balanced mercantile ambition with tidal realities. It is a notably rich city map: streets, wharves, and civic spaces are identified with uncommon precision, while a comprehensive key enumerates institutions central to Charleston’s identity. At a moment when urban reform and modernization were accelerating, the plan captures a city articulating its neighborhoods and public realm with confidence, and it does so with the poise and craftsmanship of William Keenan’s hand.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe cartography reveals a distinct urban order organized around Meeting and King Streets, with Broad, Queen, and Tradd binding the civic core to the waterfront along East Bay. Cumberland, Anson, and Archdale thread through churchyards and merchant blocks; Wentworth, Beaufain, and George mark the steady, westward push toward Rutledge Avenue and emerging residential quarters. Vendue Range signals the bustling exchange district at the harbor’s edge, where piers and counting houses concentrated maritime commerce. The map’s indexed list—numbered through 80 public buildings—guides the viewer to courthouses, churches, exchanges, markets, banks, and charitable institutions, an unusually full civic inventory that elevates this plan beyond mere street layout into a documentary of the city’s cultural, religious, and economic architecture.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEqually revealing are the eight fire wells plotted across the grid—purposeful punctuation marks in a city repeatedly tested by flames. In the wake of the devastating 1838 fire, Charleston invested in public safety, and this plan memorializes that resolve in cartographic form. The placement of wells near dense commercial corridors and historic parishes suggests municipal forethought, while the concentration around Anson Street and the East Bay underscores areas of heightened risk. Seen together with the generous street widths along Meeting and King, the wells attest to a program of resilience: an early, infrastructural choreography devised to slow conflagrations, supply water, and protect the churches, halls, and warehouses enumerated in the map’s meticulous key.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eModernity arrives here on rails. The South Carolina Railroad and its depot anchor the city’s northern approaches, knitting Charleston to the interior just as wharves along East Bay channeled Atlantic trade. This duality—cotton and passengers in, goods and people out—reshaped King Street’s commercial spine and broadened the reach of Broad Street’s courts and counting rooms. By tracing the rail alignment against thoroughfares like Meeting, South, and Laurens Streets, the plan shows how transportation corridors reframed urban movement, property lines, and investment. Few city plans of the 1840s register this infrastructural hinge so clearly, making Keenan’s work an essential lens on how Charleston balanced its venerable port culture with the onward pull of the railroad age.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEngraved by William Keenan, the plan bears the hallmarks of a craftsman equally at ease with art and exactitude. Keenan’s name is closely linked with several birds-eye views of Charleston—an expertise that sharpens his ground-level cartography here, from the crisp street labelling to the confident delineation of public edifices. His broader contributions have been recognized by scholars such as Reps, while Tooley notes his reach into works associated with Ramsey’s Annals of Tennessee—evidence of a cartographer whose influence extended well beyond the Lowcountry. This plan distills that range into a single, authoritative statement: a city anatomized through line, index, and infrastructure, and an engraver whose clarity transforms local knowledge into enduring, historical intelligence.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eStreets and roads on this map\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eAnson Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eArchdale Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eBeaufain Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eBroad Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eChurch Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eColombo Lane\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eCumberland Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eEast Bay Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eGeorge Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eKing Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eLaurens Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eMeeting Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eMurray Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eQueen Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eRutledge Avenue\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSouth Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eTradd Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eVendue Range\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eWentworth Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eWest Street\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNotable Features \u0026amp; Landmarks\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eA detailed list of public buildings numbered up to 80\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eEight fire wells for fire safety\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSouth Carolina Railroad and depot indicating transportation routes\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHistorical and design context\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eScarce early lithographed plan issued in September 1844\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eCreated by William Keenan, a highly skilled engraver\/lithographer recognized for Charleston views; noted by scholars Reps and Tooley\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eHigh-quality monochrome lithography that mimics engraving, emphasizing detail over color\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eReflects Charleston’s 1840s urban planning and infrastructure priorities, including transportation and public safety\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eProvides insights into the city’s antebellum urban landscape and architectural development\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\u003cp\u003ePlease double check the images to make sure that a specific town or place is shown on this map. You can also get in touch and ask us to check the map for you.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis map looks great at every size, but I always recommend going for a larger size if you have space. That way you can easily make out all of the details. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis map looks amazing at sizes all the way up to 50in (125cm). If you are looking for a larger map, please \u003ca href=\"\/de\/pages\/contact-us\"\u003eget in touch\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e  \u003cp\u003eThe model in the listing images is holding the 16x20in (40x50cm) version of this map.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe fifth listing image shows an example of my map personalisation service.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIf you’re looking for something slightly different, check out my collection of the \u003ca href=\"\/de\/collections\/all-old-vintage-antique-maps\"\u003ebest old maps\u003c\/a\u003e to see if something else catches your eye.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePlease \u003ca href=\"\/de\/pages\/contact-us\"\u003econtact me\u003c\/a\u003e to check if a certain location, landmark or feature is shown on this map.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis would make a wonderful birthday, Christmas, Father's Day, work leaving, anniversary or housewarming gift for someone from the areas covered by this map.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis map is available as a giclée print on acid free archival matte paper, or you can buy it framed. The frame is a nice, simple black frame that suits most aesthetics. Please get in touch if you'd like a different frame colour or material. My frames are glazed with super-clear museum-grade acrylic (perspex\/acrylite), which is significantly less reflective than glass, safer, and will always arrive in perfect condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"The Unique Maps Co.","offers":[{"title":"12x16in (30x40cm) \/ Map","offer_id":57969072865664,"sku":"UM00274717A","price":41.95,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":true},{"title":"12x16in (30x40cm) \/ Framed map","offer_id":57969072898432,"sku":"UM00274718A","price":111.95,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":true},{"title":"12x16in (30x40cm) \/ Framed canvas map","offer_id":57969072931200,"sku":"UM00274719A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":true},{"title":"A3 (297x420mm) \/ Map","offer_id":57969072963968,"sku":"UM00274720A","price":41.95,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":true},{"title":"A3 (297x420mm) \/ Framed map","offer_id":57969072996736,"sku":"UM00274721A","price":111.95,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":true},{"title":"A3 (297x420mm) \/ Framed canvas 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