Before starting History 396: Digital History, I had never knowingly used or created anything using HGIS. The closest I had come to experiencing such a system was looking up my house on Google Maps. I have a lot of experience as a user of geographic information systems, but not as a creator. I especially have not had a lot of experience using geographic information systems for academic or historical purposes.

Luckily, for our lab sessions concerning HGIS, our class was provided with lessons from the Programming Historian to use with the ArcGIS software found on the lab computers. The first lesson involved mapping data about the Great Plains Population. Our class did not have to gather or manufacture such data; we were able to download a zip file from the Programming Historian website that contained maps and statistical data. From there, we were instructed to open ArcMap, then load the map data from the zip file into the program. Here, I made my first mistake and learned my first lesson. As all the map data concerns the Great Plains, all the data is titled as such. Because the data is titled so similarly, if a person is not reading the file names closely there is a very good chance that they can load the wrong file into ArcMap. Obviously, this is a mistake on my part, not a fault of the software, but nevertheless, it is important to be aware of the files you load into your HGIS software so as to avoid mapping the wrong data set.

Once the map data was loaded, we were to symbolize and arrange the two map layers. This way, we would be able to view both maps at the same time. The layer that contained the state boundaries was made hollow and its outline thickened, while the layer that contained the county boundaries retained its fill colour. Next, we learned how to load attribute data: the digitized descriptions of geographic places. Adding this data was fairly simple and after this task was done, the next step was to join the map data and the attribute data. While I found this task pretty simple at the time, I think that this task would be fairly difficult if I did not have the Programming Historian lesson to refer to, as this process involves quite a few steps. After the map and attribute data was joined, I followed the steps to properly classify certain fields and break values. Below is the resulting map, which shows the states with a high Norwegian-born population.

After I had mapped all the data, I generated a finished map by adding a title, legend, and scale. This map is pictured below.

The next lesson I tried, Lesson 3: Georeferencing Maps, involved lining up two maps with similar regions. The first few steps in this lesson were pretty easy, as I had just done basically the same steps in Lesson 1. These steps involved adding the reference data and symbolizing and arranging the map layers. After I had all the required data loaded into ArcMap, I then started the main focus of the lesson: georeferencing the map and adding control points. By adding control points, I was able to better match up the boundaries of each map. One important thing I learned from this step, was to take care in which control points you delete from the Link Table. Sometimes, I would delete a control point and the map would barely change. However, other times I would delete a control point and my entire map would warp to be completely unrecognizable. Luckily, I was able to get my control points under control in order to create the georeferenced map featured below.

Overall, I think the Programming Historian lessons provided a good introduction to the world of HGIS. Obviously, HGIS is very complex and it requires many steps to create a good set of data, let alone a successful map based on that data. It would be overly ambitious to think that a person could develop a comprehensive understanding of such software and information systems over the course of two lab periods. Additionally, even after taking the Programming Historian lessons, I do not know that I would be able to recreate my successful maps without assistance. If I were given the map and attribute data, as well as access to ArcMap, but was not able to access the Programming Historian lessons or another similar resource, I feel that I would be prone to making mistakes and forgetting certain steps of the process.

HGIS is obviously a very useful tool that can be used to represent different sorts of data in a variety of ways. Having never encountered HGIS before this class, I feel that the Programming Historian lessons have taught me quite a bit about the technology. However, I think I would have to practice using the technology more and follow some more Programming Historian lessons on the topic before I could truly feel confident using HGIS.