{"id":12116,"date":"2010-03-18T11:13:25","date_gmt":"2010-03-18T10:13:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/?p=1612"},"modified":"2021-08-17T09:02:22","modified_gmt":"2021-08-17T07:02:22","slug":"stunning-business-intelligence-visualizations-from-1830","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/2010\/03\/stunning-business-intelligence-visualizations-from-1830.html","title":{"rendered":"Stunning Business Intelligence Visualizations\u2026 from 1870"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"1830censusbanner\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830censusbanner.jpg?resize=690%2C310&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"1830censusbanner\" width=\"690\" height=\"310\" border=\"0\" \/><\/p>\n<p>FastCompany has a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fastcompany.com\/1584957\/infographic-o-the-day-what-the-census-said-about-usin-1870\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">great article<\/a> this week on the results of the 1870 census, and the hand-made graphics (\u201cBI \u20132.0\u201d?) that were made from the data (thanks to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.radicalcartography.net\/index.html?9thcensus\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">RadicalCartography.net<\/a> and the <a href=\"http:\/\/memory.loc.gov\/cgi-bin\/ampage?collId=gmd&amp;action=browse&amp;fileName=gmd370m\/g3701m\/g3701gm\/gct00008\/ct_browse.db&amp;displayType=3&amp;maxCols=3&amp;recNum=0&amp;itemLink=r?ammem\/gmd:@field(NUMBER+@band(g3701gm+gct00008))&amp;title2=Statistical%20atlas%20of%20the%20United%20States%20based%20on%20the%20results%20of%20the%20ninth%20census%201870%20with%20contributions%20from%20many%20eminent%20men%20of%20science%20and%20several%20departments%20of%20the%20government%20Comp.%20under%20the%20authority%20of%20Congress%20by%20Francis%20A.%20Walker,%20M.%20A.,%20superintedent%20of%20the%20ninth%20census%20...&amp;linkText=Back+to+bibliographic+information\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Library of Congress<\/a>). [NOTE &#8212; the original version of this post erroneously said &#8220;1830&#8221; throughout]<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s a selection of my favorites \u2013 click on each one to get the full graphic.<\/p>\n<p>US geology \u2013 the hand-shading is so much nicer to look at than computer-generated graphics:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.timoelliott.com\/docs\/1830%20geology%20map.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"1830 census map\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830censusmap.jpg?resize=691%2C482&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"1830 census map\" width=\"691\" height=\"482\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Nationality data mapped:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.radicalcartography.net\/9thcensus\/9th27.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"9th27\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/9th271.jpg?resize=690%2C841&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"9th27\" width=\"690\" height=\"841\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s a lot of history illustrated in this fiscal chart:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The light blue spike in the lower right is the <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/American_Civil_War\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">US Civil War<\/a> (1861-1865), which prompted the introduction of a \u201ctemporary\u201d <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Revenue_Act_of_1862\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">progressive income tax<\/a> (the light pink blob in the lower left) that was originally supposed to expire in 1866!<\/li>\n<li>The pink blobs on the right are a record of expenditures on the <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/American_Indian_Wars\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">US Indian wars<\/a><\/li>\n<li>The dark blue spike in the middle of the left-hand chart shows land sales in the West \u2013 which <a href=\"http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/pss\/2116177\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">may have caused<\/a> the <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Panic_of_1837\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">collapse of the banking system in 1837<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.timoelliott.com\/docs\/1830censusfiscalchart.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"1830censusfiscalchart\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830censusfiscalchart.jpg?resize=690%2C520&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"1830censusfiscalchart\" width=\"690\" height=\"520\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>This is a beautiful rendering of church-going in the US. Interestingly, rather than show non-churchgoers as a separate bar, they are relegated to a grey box around the outside.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.timoelliott.com\/docs\/1830censuschurch.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"1830censuschurch\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830censuschurch.jpg?resize=690%2C908&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"1830censuschurch\" width=\"690\" height=\"908\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s a nice example of showing data through proportions.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.timoelliott.com\/docs\/1830shading.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"1830shading\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830shading.jpg?resize=690%2C532&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"1830shading\" width=\"690\" height=\"532\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>And here\u2019s proof that men are bigger idiots than women! (of course, they meant what we\u2019d call \u201cmentally ill\u201d these days)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.timoelliott.com\/docs\/1830census%20pie%20idiocy.jpg\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"1830census pie idiocy\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830censuspieidiocy.jpg?resize=690%2C292&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"1830census pie idiocy\" width=\"690\" height=\"292\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.timoelliott.com\/docs\/1830census%20insanity.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"1830census insanity\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830censusinsanity.jpg?resize=690%2C910&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"1830census insanity\" width=\"690\" height=\"910\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Population charts showing that the \u201ccowboy states\u201d (e.g. Wyoming, Nevada, Montana) were populated by young male foreigners, while Utah had LOTS of children.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.timoelliott.com\/docs\/1830censuspopulation.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"1830censuspopulation\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830censuspopulation.jpg?resize=690%2C896&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"1830censuspopulation\" width=\"690\" height=\"896\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>This chart is a good example of something that hasn\u2019t changed much in the last couple of centuries \u2013 the notion that you should show data just because you have it. For example, Chart 1 below show deaths per month per state. Is this data actionable in any way?<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/assets.timoelliott.com\/docs\/1830censusdeaths.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"1830censusdeaths\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830censusdeaths.jpg?resize=690%2C922&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"1830censusdeaths\" width=\"690\" height=\"922\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Later charts aren\u2019t nearly as attractive, like these, from the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.census.gov\/population\/www\/cen2000\/censusatlas\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">2000 Census:<\/a><\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/image.jpg?resize=690%2C251&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"image\" width=\"690\" height=\"251\" border=\"0\" \/><\/p>\n<p>If you liked this post, you might also like:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/2009\/02\/giant_brains_did_edmund_berkel.html\">Giant Brains: Did Edmund Berkeley Predict Email, the Internet, ERP Systems and the iPhone in 1949?<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/2007\/11\/the_real_pioneer_of_business_i.html\">The Real Pioneer of Business Intelligence (and BI 2.0)?<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/2007\/06\/performance_excellence_past_an.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Performance Excellence, Past and Future?<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As any reader of Edward Tufte knows, data visualization has been around a long time. Here&#8217;s some nice examples from the 1870 US census.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1599,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[198,204,240,530,541,573,718,1124],"class_list":["post-12116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-business-analytics","tag-business-intelligence","tag-chart","tag-gis","tag-graphics","tag-history","tag-mapping","tag-visualization"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/1830censuscover.jpg?fit=668%2C300&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3X9RF-39q","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12116"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12116\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20603,"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12116\/revisions\/20603"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timoelliott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}