The History of Hudson Map

Hudson Map Company is a 120 year old, 4th generation map company. The company was founded in 1892 by Horace B. Hudson from whom the company's name was derived.

Mr. Hudson wanted to develop his own cartographic capabilities so he started his own company, Hudson Map Company. He started out by making a small handbook of Minneapolis that highlighted things to do and see in the metro area. This small handbook was recognized as a must-have for visitors and people new to the area.

The company began by publishing maps and handbooks for the businesses and citizens of a new and rapidly growing commercial center. This was Minneapolis and St Paul in it's early years. Hudson Map's initial location was in the Kasota building in downtown Minneapolis.

Charles L. Hall worked in Kansas City, Missouri as a cartographer drawing trip maps for a company that specialized in making promotional maps. In the early 1900's he moved to Minneapolis and started drawing maps for Hudson Map Company.

A few years after starting at Hudson Map, Mr. Hall and another employee, Mr. Walter Eng, bought Hudson Map from Horace Hudson.

Mr. Hall and Mr. Eng changed the direction of Hudson Map by opening a map store in conjunction with the other business of the company.

Walter Eng retired in 1945 and Charles L. Hall became the sole stockholder of Hudson Map.

Mr Hall felt it necessary to expand the current map coverage of the Twin Cities area in anticipation of future growth. In the late 1940's he expanded the Twin Cities area into four sectional maps.

The family tradition began in 1952 when Kenneth L Hall came into the business.

In the mid 1950's Hudson Map started producing larger, easy to read, wall size maps of the metro area. This soon became the major product of the company.

In 1965 Ken Hall, then president of Hudson Map, had the idea of cutting the large maps into sections and compiling them into atlas form. In the fall of that year the first Twin City Street Atlas was published. The initial printing was 5,000 books.

Charles T. Hall joined the family business in 1972 and is currently responsible for the daily operations of Hudson Map Company.

Joshua T. Hall came into the family business in 1997 as a cartographer. Josh helped to convert the old digital mapping system to a new up-to-date computer mapping system. Josh represents the fourth generation of Halls to be involved in Hudson Map Company.

Hudson Map was sold to its present owner in 2012.