Common property mapping and the preservation of traditional rights in Chesapeake Bay's oyster fishery, 1892–1914

Abstract

Conflicts over oysters intensified along the US mid-Atlantic coast as traditional management of these valuable resources broke down in the late nineteenth century. In response, states founded management agencies, and mapping oysters was one of their first activities. Virginia and Maryland's first cartographers favored privatizing common property, an alteration that would have displaced thousands of oystermen and benefited wealthier segments of the industry. Cartographers sought to use maps to expand privatization; however, Chesapeake Bay oystermen were numerous enough to wield political influence, and they rejected one of the first major surveys and shaped the production of the other two, using them to protect their common property while making these rights visible to the State. Many conservation practices in the eastern USA grew out of local people's traditions, and this study explores the role of the mapping process amid the broader context of a shift in the scale of management to state agencies.