Esso Road Maps from the United KingdomEsso Road Maps from the United KingdomThis page shows one example from each series of Esso maps produced in the UK. There are 8 numbered sections for all series to 1985 and the cartographer was Edward Stanford Limited up to 1967. From 1968 they are credited to George Philip Printers Ltd, as George Philip & Son had acquired Stanford. (As George Philip & Son also had the contract for Shell & BP maps, it is likely that they deliberately put the Esso work through a sister company.)
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| ca1950-ca1955 | ca1956-1961 | 1960-61 (some) | 1962-64 (65 Ireland) | 1965 |
Maps are side folded to 1961 and top folded thereafter. The earliest design was probably drawn in the late 1940s, but may not have been issued until the wartime petrol pooling arrangements had been ended and Esso branded petrol was on sale once more. The 1960-1 covers are a transitional design, using the larger format and side fold but introducing photos used on all maps from 1962. The 1960-65 photographic covers used 2 photos for each section, usually changing after 1964. Section 6 (Southern Scotland) is shown above in each case, with the older picture of the Forth Railway Bridge being replaced by the Scott Memorial in Edinburgh. Sizes: 1952-61 - 8.5 x 4 in; 1962-87 - 8.2 x 3.8 in.
There is a page on this website showing all 1950s Esso UK Scenic covers and another on how to date these maps as they lack copyright dates.
Esso maps from 1966 to 1980
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| 1966-68 | 1969-70 | 1971-73 | 1974-75 | 1977-80 |
The 1966-8 series used the same photographs as the 1965 red top maps. The section shown above (no.4 = Wales & Midlands) has an attractive picture a red Austin Healey car parked outside the Feathers Hotel in Ludlow, Shropshire. Completely new cartography was used from 1971 onwards with a larger map, although still at the same scale of 5 miles to the inch, and more town plans on the reverse. All the photographic or art covers varied by section; only those based around a map of the country were essentially common. The final 1970s covers, drawn by Dolesch, are particularly attractive with each containing many landmarks from the area of the map.
1980s and 1990s maps |
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| 1983 & 85 | 1986-7 | 1990-2 | 1994 |
The 1983/5 maps were the final George Philip series. Inflation had taken the price of an Esso map up from 6d (2½p) in 1965 - unchanged from 1950 - to £2.50 in 1986, a 100-fold increase. (The Scotland A-Z map cost £3.00, as it was printed on both sides of the paper and covered twice the area of the English sections.) The following year a further 10% raise took the price to £2.75. However this was greater than general inflation and by the 1980s the number of Esso maps sold was very much lower than in the 1950s and 60s. Geographers' A-Z Co drew the 1986-7 maps, the only known example of their working for an oil company, and the Automobile Association used new computer cartography in 1990-2. The A-Z series has 5 sections (no London or Ireland) and the AA one 9 unnumbered. The A-Z and AA series are pasted into a card cover. Esso also produced a number of hard cover road atlases of which the first edition (1971) has a cover showing a motorway junction similar in general design to the sheet map of the same year. No sheet maps are known dated 1976, 1981-2, 1984, 1988-9 or since 1992.
In 1994 Esso Lubricare issued a large format softback atlas with 158 pages of Philip's maps (including indexes) for use as an on-pack promotion. A couple of years later Philip's produced a medium format spiral bound atlas for Esso Lubricants (not shown), described as being a Superplanner Road Atlas Britain & Ireland. After Esso discontinued UK maps, its Irish subsidiary commissioned a map of Ireland from Bartholomews.
Sizes: A-Z 9.5 x 6 in; AA 10.8 x 5.3 in; atlas 12 x 9 in.
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Esso's 1971-3 road atlases were hardback, without dust covers, and used the new cartography prepared by Philip's - although the flysheet still named Edward Stanford Ltd as the publisher. Ireland and London were included and there was a full index on blue paper for the road maps and pink paper for London streets.
Edward Stanford also drew a series of cruising guides starting with the Norfolk Broads in the early 1950s and culminating in a complete guide to the English Channel, dating from 1965 (above). The cover is of Honfleur Harbour, France. Three different cover designs are known for the Airport map specially prepared by Sampson Low & Co, which included a plane-spotters' guide to airlines using the airport on the reverse.
The next two items are not really maps, but include sketch maps of recommended sightseeing routes. The Tiger Trail of Cornwall dates from the mid 1960s and is one of a number known to exist for the county. Other Tiger Trails were probably also available from Esso dealers in other areas. In 1966 Esso published two 20 page booklets each with 16 full-page tours under the name "Off the Beaten Track". Volume 1 contained tours in Scotland, Northern England, the Midlands & East Anglia; Volume 2 concentrated on the Thames Valley, Wales, Southern & Western England. Each trip was augmented by attractive pen and ink drawings of sights passed.
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In 1932 Anglo-American Oil Company had asked AE Taylor to prepare a series of "Pictorial Plans" to tourist areas of Britain, as well as some of the historic main roads. These were distributed under the Pratts name on thick paper; but in the mid 1930s they were reprinted on much thinner paper for inclusion in a book under the Esso name. The example shown here is of the West Country. |
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Text and layout © Ian Byrne, 2000-4 |
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