Introduction to Puerto Rico Genealogy: Geographical Resources

Mapa topografico de la isla de Puerto Rico; Contornos de Ponce [inset with title of full page map]; Mapa de los contornos de San Juan de Puerto Rico [inset] ; Plano de San Juan de Puerto Rico [inset]., Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division, The New York Public Library.

The Library's Map Division holds thousands of maps and other cartographic materials, some of which can be found by searching the online Library catalog (see results from the Map Division), but not all materials in the Map Division are listed in the online catalog. As Map Librarian Nancy Kandoian explains in "Maps in the Gap: Discovering The Map Division’s Dictionary Catalog, Now Online":

While most of the atlases, books, and periodicals in the Map Division collections are described in and discoverable via the online Research Catalog, most of the separate maps acquired by the library up to 1970 are not. Those maps were described for the division’s card catalog, ... which was maintained up to 1970.  After that time, the card catalog was "frozen." No more records were added, the cards were photographed, and the card images were compiled and published in a 10-volume Dictionary Catalog of the Map Division by G.K. Hall & Co. in 1971.  

A thorough search of the Map Division’s holdings must include a consultation of this catalog.  It is available in the Map Division (Room 117 of the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building), in the General Research Division (Room 315), in many large research libraries throughout the world and, now, in digital form, thanks to modern technology and behind-the-scenes human efforts.

Images of pages of each volume of the Dictionary Catalog are hosted online by the HathiTrust Digital Library. 

Tip: Searching the Dictionary Catalog? Puerto Rico is in Volume 8. More cartographic material may be found if you search by city.