- Tri-City Park, a city park I was lucky enough to live near. I would ride my bike around it and run around it while on the cross country team. I used to feed the ducks old bread when my grandparents would visit.
- The neglected back area of the park was filled with BMX jumps and I spent pretty much every afternoon here riding my bike
- The community pool where I learned to swim
- My family (four of us) lived in a little 2 bedroom condo here on the corner, about 800 sq ft in size. I spent most of my time riding my bike on the street everyday, all day, all year long
- My junior high school
- This used to be a golf course where my dad was a marshall on the weekends and my brother caddied at once in a while
- There used to be a huge orange grove here
- The little condo place also had a tennis court at the end of my street, but I rarely played. It seems like I lived in a really nice place, almost country club-like, but really, it was a glorified apartment complex with attached little homes, all connected
- My closest friend growing up lived here (haven't said a word to him in probably 12 years)
- Clint lived back here. His parents were never home and his dad had a huge collection of playboys and porn Clint would pilfer. Clint freaked me out and I rarely hung out with him.
- Stacey lived here. Her family annoyed me, though one time in summer camp I had to dance with her when I told someone I liked Stacey, but I meant another Stacey at camp, not her. It was...awkward.
- My first girlfriend lived here ("Lisa"). I met her the summer between 7th and 8th grade when she moved in. We never kissed, and when school started I ignored her because she was in 7th and I was in 8th. I was an ass.
- Aaron lived around here. He was on The Real World (LA) while in college. He was the blond surfer dude from UCLA on that show.
- I almost got hit by a car here when I was very young, when an ice cream truck drove by that I chased. I think I was 7 at the time. It was so close I learned a lesson I still remember today.
- A friend had a newspaper route he did on his bike. They dropped off papers here each afternoon and I would fill in from time to time.
- I was in cross country in 7th and 8th grades and somehow we would have 2 mile races here at the school and around the park and back. Looking at the map now, I don't see how we fit any mileage in such a small area.
My childhood, seen by Google Maps
All true stories. I can't believe so many memories exist in one screen full of the map. I wish Google Maps had this kind of annotation.
Here's the live Google Maps URL I used to grab this image of Placentia, California.
Comments and faves
Luke Robinson, Ian Main, GriLLo, vanderwal, and 81 other people added this photo to their favorites.
kaicarver (99 months ago | reply)
Very nice.
Luke Robinson (99 months ago | reply)
Ahh mate, you have trumped again. Very cool idea and good combo of Google/Flickr magic.
jimnellis (99 months ago | reply)
Very cool. Could you please direct me toward information re: mouse-over narrative. Thanks.
Plutor (99 months ago | reply)
You inspired me. I propose the tag of "memorymap" for this proto-meme.
fenriq (99 months ago | reply)
This is awesome, Matt. A tremendously cool idea for a new Flickr group!
Britt Parrott (99 months ago | reply)
Excellent way to tell a story. At first, I read one of the tags as placenta. It took a quick OneLook search to figure out what placentia was. My childhood home in Smyrna, TN, will work well for a memorymap since I lived next to all the schools. Thanks for the idea.
fenriq (99 months ago | reply)
Matt, I've initiated a new Flickr Group called MemoryMap based on this superb idea. Come join us!
waxpancake (99 months ago | reply)
Very nice! (So many Staceys, so little time.)
doobybrain (99 months ago | reply)
this is really neat. i think you've inspired me to do the same.
eyemage (99 months ago | reply)
im reminded of the firefox google map hack that allows you to assign pictures to locations on the map...wish flickr had that function too, where the notes could link to other pics...or can they do that now?
great work!
js42 (99 months ago | reply)
You might be interested in a site I created www.tagwhere.com to tag physical places . However, the flickr annotations and google maps is a pretty killer combo. Too cool.
Girlhattan (99 months ago | reply)
i absolutely LOVE this idea.
♥
mmahaffie (99 months ago | reply)
Wild. Interesting to look at DC and see how thay handled the security-vs-public-access issues.
Also. I've been trying to get together an on-line map site that would allow people to add annotation data similar to what you've done, but to save the markers (points or polygons) as part of a new spatial data set. Maybe I should check out "tagwhere" above. We have a maps site with some imagery of Delaware at that we call the Delaware DataMIL.
follower (99 months ago | reply)
Take a look at myGmaps, it enables you to create, save and host custom data files and display them with Google Maps.
Using "minipages" you put any HTML you want into the pop-up location balloons.
It includes a "standalone viewer" service so you can display the map on your own web site.
Check out this example Google Map with custom data.
--Phil.
danxoneil (99 months ago | reply)
I have propagated the idea of Emotional Geographies for some time now. Is there any programmer out there willing to make this?
juggernautco.typepad.com/dxo/2005/01/emotiona l_geogr.html
danxoneil (99 months ago | reply)
Um, never mind. myGmaps is it-- thanks follower!
ken mohnkern (99 months ago | reply)
Can anyone suggest an alternative to Google's satellite images? Theirs doesn't zoom in far enough for me (and its nearest zoom is a crappy image).
ken mohnkern (99 months ago | reply)
In answer to my own question: Microsoft's Terraserver does a pretty good job.
rubenarakelyan (99 months ago | reply)
Wow, an interesting account of your childhood in just one map. The combination of Google Maps and Flickr stuff is just excellent. Another brilliant idea: I'm sure many others will start taking up the idea for themselves...
hensonkid (99 months ago | reply)
I know this is a stupid question, but how do I save and then upload the google sat image I want to use? Do I need to make a screenshot?
mathowie (99 months ago | reply)
Yeah, I made a screenshot in windows, cut it down in Photoshop and uploaded here.
joaobambu (99 months ago | reply)
Marvelous Idea; I am also inspired by it and hope to follow suit...
xbrendanx (99 months ago | reply)
Poor Stace.
Tom (hmm a rosa tint) (99 months ago | reply)
Nice idea, if only they mapped the UK like this.
Stewf (99 months ago | reply)
Now if only Flickr notes allowed HTML links. Then the possibilities really open up. (Click to move to another photo, zoomed in.)
hirider90 (99 months ago | reply)
I can't believe I stumbled on to this. I grew up here too. This is off of Kraemer and Golden, I used to ride that park with my BMX bike everyday!!
hirider90 (99 months ago | reply)
Oh yeah, I used to play in the mud at Tri-City with my Toyota 4x4 where the orange grove was.
hirider90 (99 months ago | reply)
Did you ever go to Colasses(sp) in Y.L.?
mathowie (99 months ago | reply)
Yeah, I did hirider90. I was friends with George Smoot and Brian Castillo, and we rode there a bunch. We rode at "the ditch" off McCormack and Bastanchury, where George lived. But I was mostly a flatland guy.
thijs o (99 months ago | reply)
Great way to do this, mathowie. I built something similar for myself a long time ago (although I have only recently been filling it up).
And, of course, until Google Maps does the whole world I'm out of luck anyway... ;)
Just_Tom (99 months ago | reply)
Snakerboy - MultiMap has aerial photos for most areas of the UK. You can overlay maps too, and have been able to for a while.
You could stitch some together in a couple of minutes if you wanted to do this... but is it fair use?
arjuna1969 (99 months ago | reply)
What a trip. I stumbled into this site via Robot Wisdom. I ran my first 10K race at Tri-City Park (1981) and at least three Freeway League cross country championships there as well ('84-'86). I wonder if there's a way to combine this or myGmaps with a Wiki, open-editing format. That way, you could gather other people's memories of the same city district. Something like Mr Beller's Neighborhood [mrbellersneighborhood.com] only a lot faster and no central editor deciding whose memories are best.
Could be fun or it could be a total mess. Either way it would be interesting.
mathowie (99 months ago | reply)
I wish Google Maps had an api, so that someone could build an annotation/wiki service for people to share stories on.
jals (99 months ago | reply)
I love to see Google and Yahoo! products used together to create something cool. >:D
ugga (99 months ago | reply)
BORING!!!!!!!!!!!
shadowbox (99 months ago | reply)
The best flickrmeme I've seen since the see-thru desktop. Here's my memorymap.
macfixer (99 months ago | reply)
Straight-up awesome!
//k
Reggie1 (99 months ago | reply)
Great idea. I think I will have to do something like this after running into a high school classmate that I haven't since....well, high school...over 20 years.
jason3d (99 months ago | reply)
Very cool.
mahke (98 months ago | reply)
Wow! This has been linked from BBC News! :)
zenera (98 months ago | reply)
Fascinating!
rmod (98 months ago | reply)
Life is even more simple than this image!!!
amysayrawr (98 months ago | reply)
Wow. I made a low-tech version of this a while back...I think the high-tech version will catch on more, though. We need an atlas of these!
gszczyrb (98 months ago | reply)
I don't know if you are the first, but great job! Here is mine.
flickr.com/photos/35006406@N00/10097960/
jonrochelle (92 months ago | reply)
Matt, I'm looking for feedback on just such an annotation site.... called mapkeeper... www.mapkeeper.com
You can create maps with many markers then you can share links to those maps (view only) and even iFrame the map on an existing page (even as inline content on your blog!)... it's pretty cool... still needs some work, but would appreciate any feedback. You can include IMG tags in the marker descriptions to get images in the map markers.
martin31 [deleted] (92 months ago | reply)
If you want to geolocate photos, you may be interested in www.panoramio.com
Oh Richard (87 months ago | reply)
im totally doing this. hope you dont mind!
alexander_beston (86 months ago | reply)
yep +1. i'll be doing this aswell!
Ozgur Alaz (Marketallica) (85 months ago | reply)
telling story with google maps
Great idea:)
DavidDMuir (84 months ago | reply)
I only just discovered this image and thought it was a brilliant idea. I had a go at one of my own and included a reference to it a blog post. Hope that's OK.
Thanks for inspiring me. :-)