Dr. Stephen J. Hornsby

Professor of Geography and Canadian Studies — Formerly Director, Canadian-American Center, and Director, National Resource Center on Canada (U.S. Department of Education Title VI program), 1994-2021.

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

  • 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

Courses

As I am retiring in Summer 2025, the following courses are offered for the last time.
 
Spring 2025

GEO 275: Geography of Globalization

GEO 410: North American Historical Geography (seminar)

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

Publications

New Book

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

Atlas

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
Stephen J. Hornsby Picturing America: The Golden Age of American Pictorial Maps. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press with the Library of Congress, 2017
Surveyors of Empire
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
Stephen J. Hornsby. Nineteenth-Century Cape Breton: A Historical Geography. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1992
British Atlantic, American Frontier
Stephen J. Hornsby British Atlantic, American Frontier: Spaces of Power in Early Modern British America. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 2005
Stephen J. Hornsby. Time and Tide: The Transformation of Bear River, Nova Scotia. Orono: Northeast Folklore, 1996
Stephen J. Hornsby. Time and Tide: The Transformation of Bear River, Nova Scotia. Orono: Northeast Folklore, 1996

Edited Books

Editor, Martyn J. Bowden, Great Ports of the Mercantile Era. Orono, ME: University of Maine Press, 2023
New England and the Maritime Provinces
Stephen J. Hornsby and John G. Reid, eds. New England and the Maritime Provinces: Connections and Comparisons. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2005
The Northeastern Borderlands: Four Centuries of Interaction
Stephen J. Hornsby, Victor A. Konrad and James J. Herlan, eds. The Northeastern Borderlands: Four Centuries of Interaction. Fredericton, NB: Acadiensis Press, 1989

Recent Articles and Chapters

  • (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).