Wow, great maps and backstories! What's the current US capital?
Wow, that's a huge oversight, ha ha! I'll pretend I excluded that from the map on purpose, but really, I'm not sure. Philly was made the capital after DC was evacuated, and is probably the capital again by the modern day, but Cincinnati and maybe Peoria will serve as capitals at various points in US history.
Washington still exists as a satellite of the larger city of Alexandria, dotted with military cemeteries and memorials to famous politicians - the area would be known as the Graveyard of America's Heroes. I'm about to post a wikibox for it over on the wikibox thread.
Philly contains all the history and architecture of early America, plus no particular ideological association.
Cincinnati would have great infrastructure and Beaux-Arts buildings, but it would also be associated with the corruption and imperial attitude of the Gilded Era governments that built it. Westerners and Southerners might prefer the location.
I've toyed with the idea of the mid-20th century socialist government building a big ol brutalist capital (a la Brasilia) near Peoria, or somewhere in the Midwest. This obviously wouldn't last long, and by today, would be mostly good for abandoned building exploration and use as a film backdrop.
Dude, that's a book there. A big book. 70,000-100,000 words is usually the range for a novel. That's like 300-400 pages there! Are you sure you didn't accidentally add an extra digit there?
I don't want to build myself up! It's literally mostly bullet points and offhand things about, like, which languages are used where, what's happening where, who does what to who. Also a lot of notes making sense of OTL history.It would make no sense to most people. If I ever got around to turning it into a proper narrative timeline, it'd probably be shorter! Before then, I want to improve my writing skills, to best show the changes in Napoleon's personality and actions in the early period.
As others have already said, these are excellent maps and a worthy contribution to the thread. I want to see more.
Thanks! I'm grateful for all the unexpected support, especially from people whose maps I've been admiring for a while.
Hmm. There has been a certain amount of Mexico-wanking here of late: not that I mind a Mexico-wank per se, but Mexico gets too strong too close to the POD, when it needs quite a bit of time to work out all the problems the Spanish colonial heritage saddled it with. But the SW staying part of Mexico or at least (in the case of California) not joining the US isn't that implausible even without a Mighty Mexico in the given situation. Much of the US drive to conquer the SW came from the slave states (the founders of US Texas were slaveowners), with the slave power weakened early on there would be less of a push to expand, and aside from California, much of the area wasn't very appealing for farmers or plantation owners, not to mention rich in hostile Indians. (I say this as a New Mexican: it's still a bit of an empty space between the Sierras and west Texas)
My main motivation for creating this scenario is to show a more multipolar world, politically and culturally - and strengthening Mexico seemed like a good way to kill two birds with one stone, elevating Latin America on the global stage, and limiting American influence.
The chain of thought for Mexico was to head off the post-colonial chaos as much as possible. With no Peninsular Campaign, Mexico stays with Spain slightly longer, and King Francisco de Paula institutes a new wave of 'Bourbon Reforms'. This satisfies Criollo demands for autonomy, solves some of the dumber structural problems in the empire preventing economic growth, and eventually leads to a (very gradually implemented) Aranda Plan, with Mexico becoming an independent monarchy. Mexico, Spain and Spain's ally France are able to cooperate in Latin America, and by the time the Americans are ready to make a move for northern Mexico, a very different Mexico is also ready to defend themselves. A smooth transition to independence means the entire country is more stable, with Catholic immigrants from Spain, Europe and (eventually) the Philippines securing California before too many Anglos can get to the region.
That's a really good point about slavers driving US expansion, and it helps explain how an industrialised US doesn't expand southwards. However, even without the slaver influence, the US would still be pretty keen on San Francisco Bay, which would lead to some sort of conflict.
As a side note: Texas did split off similar to OTL, due to anger over Mexico's anti-slavery policies. Receiving an influx of hardcore Southern planters after the abolition of slavery in the US, Texas struggles on as a slave-driven hell, eventually collapsing as the slaves rise up in the late 19th century, necessitating a US intervention and annexation.
Regarding Europe; if it's a moderate Napoleonic victory I take it Spain probably retained it's Bourbons or are Nappy's siblings still all over the damn continent? And that US is a really nice shape, it's really hard to make the US look good while truncating their territory so you've done a bloody good job there. Hope to see more!
Thanks! Yeah, Spain remains Bourbon, though thanks to the endurance of a France loyal to its revolutionary roots, liberal agitation is quite a bit more confident. But don't feel sorry for the Bonaparte brood, the good ones will get some little states here and there.
You should definitely post any others you have, I think everyone here would appreciate it.
All the positive feedback has actually motivated me to start work on a 'redo' of my map of Africa from the timeline! In the meantime, I might post something older...
