I have an affinity for New Zealand and Australia. I have some dear friends down under, and every time I’ve visited those two countries, I’ve thought: if only I could be so lucky as to live here some day. Alas, it hasn’t happened yet.
It pains me that the US these days is throwing aside its years of cooperation with these countries. To add insult to injury, I even had to pay a tariff on the Australian-themed socks my friend Rachel sent me and the family for Christmas last year. This is an impeachable offense in my mind.)
As President Trump belittles US allies’ historic contributions to US interests and global security these days, I thought it would be fitting to create a map of all the sacrifices ANZAC has made to support the two most recent world hegemonies – Great Britain and the United States.
I used my new favorite dataset creator assistant first to develop a layered database schema of ANZAC soldiers who have lost their lives in combat. I then had it produce a schema and fill the dataset on battles, campaigns, naval actions, and prison camps that ANZAC service members have died, been injured, or taken capture in. I had it split it by country (New Zealand and Australia) for more nuanced analysis – as I know my friend Sam in Blenheim would roll over in his grave if I forced New Zealanders to always be aggregated with Australians. (He was quite the zealot that way. RIP.)
It’s not perfect. And I didn’t have time to create the soldier casualty lookup for each battle, but I hope to return to it in the future, when I’m not making daily maps…. so 2027?!
Thank you for your service, ANZAC veterans and fallen members. I appreciate it and am grateful, even though you were attacking some of my ancestors in Europe at times. Sorry I didn’t have more time to spend on this map.
P.S. Dear US Government: I expect to be reimbursed for your illegal tariff on my socks!
Original Prompt in Web Map GPT
Hi. I’ve provided a JSON with a schema, etc., for map design, etc. I’ve also uploaded a variety of CSV and MD documents that provide datasets, schemas, and definitions for a variety of things. Please peruse all of these documents, etc. Then, use the CSV dataset(s) to create a web map to the JSON spec AND your own knowledge and rules based on maps you’ve created for me before. Where are there major contradictions, please revert to your typical guidelines.
If you have questions, please just let me know. Thank you. There should be 50+ events. If you only see ~20, the CSV file isn’t uploading properly. I will try to remedy this. Thanks!
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{
“project”: {
“name”: “ANZAC Commemorative Map”,
“title”: “In Memoriam”,
“subtitle”: “The Geography of ANZAC Service and Loss”,
“tagline”: “ANZAC Day Commemorative Map”,
“purpose”: “Respectful, historically grounded interactive map showing ANZAC service and loss across time and space”
},