Recreating Old Visualizations with New Technology: Census Statistics

Programmer and data analyst Jim Vallandingham has just 're'-created a particular data visualization technique and visual style from a diagram attributed to Henry Gannett, back in 1903. The original lithographed chart depicts the proportion of foreign born of each leading nationality, in the largest cities in the U.S., and appeared in the publication following the twelfth census of the United States.

For the three examples he has featured online under the apt title "Old Visualizations Made New Again" [vallandingham.me], Jim did not use pencils or an old-school drawing board, but a combination of D3.js and Coffeescript programming skills.

The results look amazing and while screen-based, still relatively Tufte-ian, while the source-code is open for all to learn and assimilate. More detailed information is available here.