That 1970s map of Africa I found had Tanzania still called Tanganyika

I was digging through a box of old stuff my uncle left me and came across a National Geographic map from 1971. It showed Tanzania as just Tanganyika and Zanzibar were still separate, plus the border around Biafra was still marked in Nigeria. I always thought map borders were pretty stable but that thing showed me how much they shifted in just a few decades after colonies broke up. Anyone else sit there and stare at the old names for way too long?

2 comments

2 Comments

rosew3726d agoMost Upvoted

Did that map still show Lake Rudolf instead of Lake Turkana, or had they updated to the Kenyan name by then? I remember old maps having a lot of those colonial era labels that took forever to change.

thea24625d ago

Yeah, @rosew37, that map still had Lake Rudolf on it. I remember pulling it out and thinking, wow, they really took their time changing these names. It's funny how those old colonial labels just stuck around forever. I guess someone just never got around to updating the atlas after the name changed. Makes you wonder how many other outdated things are still sitting on shelves in schools. Maps are like time capsules sometimes, I suppose.