“UNIVERSALIS COSMOGRAPHIA SECUNDUM PTHOLOMAEI TRADITIONEM ET AMERICI VESPUCII ALIORU[M]QUE LUSTRATIONES.” ST. DIE, 1507. 2300 BC–1670 FLAMES FLICKERED INSIDE silver heat lamps, and potted palms swayed in the breeze atop Miami’s Mayfair Hotel on the unseasonably cool February evening that kicked off the 2013 Miami International Map Fair. Cartographic enthusiasts—most men, most gray haired, most wearing blue blazers—jostled their way to the bar as Latin techno-music pulsed through the crowd and what looked like S and M footage played on video screens above. One of the few women in the crowd shouted, “I need a seltzer right now!” as a bartender in a lace minidress stared unmoved. “You’re gonna hafta wait, ma’am,” she said. Miami may seem like the least likely place on the map to host an international cartographic conference, much less the world’s largest. But in 2013, more than a thousand people were expected to attend—more than the similar map fairs in London or Paris.
