A fascinating piece from The Big Think, April 19, 2022, “Satirical Cartography: A Century Of American Humor In Twisted Maps” by Frank Jacobs.
Above: Published in 1922: John McCutcheon‘s “New Yorker’s Map Of The United States”;
Below, Steinberg’s 1976 New Yorker cover (“View Of The World From 9th Avenue”)
After reading this piece I immediately went to Deirdre Bair’s massive Saul Steinberg: A Biography (Nan A. Talese / Doubleday, 2012) hoping for more, but unfortunately there is no mention of Mr. McCutcheon or his map.
There is this:
“Nobody knows whether the genesis of ‘The View of the World from 9th Avenue’ came from one of the free-wheeling, far-ranging dialogues of free association that happened everytime Saul Steinberg and Harold Rosenberg got together…”
Essential reading here from The Newberry, January 24, 2013, “McCutcheon’s View.”