Stephen J. Hornsby

Professor of Geography and Canadian Studies and former director of the Canadian-American Center and Title VI National Resource Center on Canada, 1994-2021.

An image of Dr. Stephen J. Hornsby

Contact information

Canadian-American Center

154 College Ave, Orono, ME 04473

hornsby@maine.edu

207.581.4226

Education

  • Ph.D. University of British Columbia 1986
  • M.A. Honours, University of St. Andrews 1979

Awards and Honors

  • Governor General’s International Award for Canadian Studies, 2025
  • Donner Medal in Canadian Studies, Association for Canadian Studies in the United States (ACSUS), 2023
  • John Brinckerhoff Jackson Prize, American Association of Geographers, for Picturing America, 2018
  • University of Maine System Trustee Professor, 2016
  • Best “Book/Atlas” and “Best of Show,” Cartography and Geographic Information Society, for Historical Atlas of Maine, 2016
  • Maine Literary Award for Excellence in Publishing, Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance, for Historical Atlas of Maine, 2016
  • Globe Award, American Association of Geographers, for Historical Atlas of Maine, 2016
  • Pierre Savard Award, International Council for Canadian Studies, for Surveyors of Empire, 2013
  • John Lyman Book Award in the category Naval and Maritime Science and Technology, North American Society for Oceanic History, for Surveyors of Empire, 2012
  • Publication of the Year Award, Prince Edward Island Museum and Heritage Foundation, for Surveyors of Empire, 2012
  • Caird Short-term Research Fellowship, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, 2007
  • Cleo Award (Atlantic Canada), Canadian Historical Association, for Nineteenth-Century Cape Breton, 1993
  • Commonwealth Scholarship, 1979-1984

Research Areas

  • Historical Geography
  • Expansion of Europe overseas
  • Eastern Canada and northeastern United States
  • American cartography in the 20th century

Current Research and Writing

Book Manuscripts

  • Cotton’s Ocean: Yankee Shipowners and the Antebellum Atlantic World
  • Twentieth Century American Popular Cartography

Recent Articles and Chapters

  • “Obituary: Cole Harris,” Journal of Historical Geography 87 (2025): 37-38.
  • (with Margaret Pearce), “Making the Coming Home Map,” Cartographica 55, 3 (2020): 170-176
  • (with Graeme Wynn), “Eldorado North?” in The Nature of Canada, edited by Colin M. Coates and Graeme Wynn, 101-121. (Vancouver, BC: On  Point Press, a UBC Press imprint, 2019).

Publications

New Book

An image of the cover of "Cod Coasts: Cultural Landscapes of the Cod Fishery from Cape Cod to Labrador"

Cod Coasts: Cultural Landscapes of the Cod Fishery from Cape Cod to Labrador

Stephen J. Hornsby, Cod Coasts: Cultural Landscapes of the Cod Fishery from Cape Cod to Labrador. Orono, ME: University of Maine Press, 2025.

Historical Atlas

An image of the cover of "Historical Atlas of Maine"

Historical Atlas of Maine

Stephen J. Hornsby and Richard W. Judd, eds. Historical Atlas of Maine. Orono, ME: University of Maine Press, 2015

History of Cartography

Stephen Hornsby - Picturing America

Picturing America: The Golden Age of American Pictorial Maps

Stephen J. Hornsby Picturing America: The Golden Age of American Pictorial Maps. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press with the Library of Congress, 2017

An image of "Surveyors of Empire: Samuel Holland, J.F.W. Des Barres, and the Making of The Atlantic Neptune"

Surveyors of Empire: Samuel Holland, J.F.W. Des Barres, and the Making of The Atlantic Neptune.

Stephen J. Hornsby Surveyors of Empire: Samuel Holland, J.F.W. Des Barres, and the Making of The Atlantic Neptune. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2011

Historical Geography

Nineteenth Century Cape Breton

Nineteenth-Century Cape Breton: A Historical Geography

Stephen J. Hornsby. Nineteenth-Century Cape Breton: A Historical Geography. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1992

Stephen Hornsby - British Atlantic, American Frontier

British Atlantic, American Frontier: Spaces of Power in Early Modern British America

Stephen J. Hornsby British Atlantic, American Frontier: Spaces of Power in Early Modern British America. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 2005

Time and Tide: The Transformation of Bear River, Nova Scotia

Stephen J. Hornsby. Time and Tide: The Transformation of Bear River, Nova Scotia. Orono: Northeast Folklore, 1996

Edited Collections

Great Ports of the Mercantile Era

Stephen J. Hornsby (ed.), Martyn J. Bowden, Great Ports of the Mercantile Era (University of Maine Press, 2023).

New England and the Maritime Provinces

New England and the Maritime Provinces: Connections and Comparisons

Stephen J. Hornsby and John G. Reid (eds.), New England and the Maritime Provinces: Connections and Comparisons (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2005).

The Northeastern Borderlands: Four Centuries of Interaction

The Northeastern Borderlands: Four Centuries of Interaction

Stephen J. Hornsby, Victor A. Konrad, and James Herlan (eds.), The Northeastern Borderlands: Four Centuries of Interaction (Acadiensis Press, 1989).