Offers an overview of the processes by which Spanish, Mexican, and US soldier-engineers mapped the southwestern frontier, as well as the local and even geopolitical consequences of their mapping. This book contains essays which focus on Spanish efforts to map the Gulf and Pacific Coasts, and to chart the inland Southwest.

Includes index.

1. Spanish Maritime Charting of the Gulf of Mexico and the California Coast / W. Michael Mathes -- 2. Spanish Military Engineers in the New World before 1750 / David Buisseret -- 3. Spanish Military Mapping of the Northern Borderlands after 1750 / Dennis Reinhartz -- 4. U.S. Army Military Mapping of the American Southwest during the Nineteenth Century / Ralph E. Ehrenberg -- 5. Henry Washington Benham: A U.S. Army Engineer's View of the U.S.-Mexican War / Gerald D. Saxon -- 6. Trabajos Desconocidos, Ingenieros Olvidados: Unknown Works and Forgotten Engineers of the Mexican Boundary Commission / Paula Rebert -- 7. Soldier-Engineers in the Geographic Understanding of the Southwestern Frontier--An Afterthought / John R. Hébert.