The “MyMaps” Google maps present information in “layers,” which can be toggled on and off by checking boxes in the legend at the left side of a map. The legend box for the current Historic Northeast Texas Map, with all layers switched off, is shown below.
Each of these layers can be accessed by clicking on its box. Opening several of these at once may result in a very busy view, so we don’t recommend that. The “Base Map” menu at the bottom offers nine different map styles. The “Terrain” map may be most useful in general; however, small roads may not be as visible as in other styles, particularly on newer Apple desktops with “Retina” screens as I have found. To help with this, it may be necessary to switch display color schemes on your monitor to find what is most useful or to go to another Base Map such as “Simple Atlas” to see the smaller roads clearly.
Generally, roads and place markers are color coded, with yellow/orange colors indicating pre-Civil War times, red being those roads and places known to have been in existence at some point between the Civil War and roughly 1920, and blue indicating those coming after 1920. In the “Century Roads” layer, green is used to show roads shown on pre-1925 maps but no longer shown in maps or otherwise known to exist.
As for icons and symbols, generally, stars are used for communities or other places of historical interest, shields are used for historical markers, and a “tree” icon for cemeteries. Squares indicate that a location is identified in land survey notes—usually used here for old roads, mostly from pre-Civil War surveys. Black colored squares indicate survey notes information from Gary Pinkerton, whose work and book on Trammel’s Trace have inspired and contributed to much of what’s here, including land survey notes.
As an example, here is an image (screenshot) of the Historic Northeast Texas map using the Simple Atlas base map and”Bowie County Places” and “Bowie County Cemeteries” layers clicked on.
Here is a similar map using the “Terrain” Base Map and adding the “Century Roads” layer. Although most of the old roads are in this layer, we do not yet have quite all of them as included in the 1918 Bowie County Soil Map, which is the primary source used here, supplemented by the 1906 New Boston and Texarkana USGS quadrangle maps for the areas they cover. Note that red indicates old roads from the Soil Map that are still in use and green indicates similar roads but no longer in use or apparent on current maps.
Clicking on a specific location identified by a star will bring up a window giving historical information on that location. In some cases this information is very limited, such as only identifying the source of the location information. This map is shown using the “Whitewater” Base Map, which is good for viewing water features, such as lakes and streams.
And, here is a “Satellite” Base Map including the “Pre-Civil War Roads” layer, which are gold colored. Note that including both this layer and the “Century Roads” layer in one view will cause overlaps and will not be as useful.
Clicking on a specific yellow road on this map will bring up a window with historical information on that road, at least in most cases–background information is not yet included for all roads.