John Ainslie

Who was John Ainslie?

John Ainslie was a Scottish surveyor and cartographer.

He was born in Jedburgh, the youngest son of John Ainslie, a druggist, Writer to the Signet and burgess of the burgh and was educated at Jedburgh Grammar School. He began his career as an apprentice to the "Geographer to King George III", engraver and publisher Thomas Jefferys and worked as a surveyor and engraver for the English County series of maps. After Jefferys' death he returned to Scotland where he surveyed Scottish counties, engraving and publishing the maps.

From 1787 to 1789 Ainslie worked on a new nine sheet map of Scotland publishing it in 1789. The map was a landmark in the improvement of the outline of Scotland and for the first time showed the Great Glen as a straight line and Skye, Mull, and Islay shown with more accuracy than had previously been seen.

He worked as a surveyor on several civil engineering projects including the Forth and Clyde canal with Robert Whitworth, Charles Rennie on Saltcoats harbour and the Glasgow to Ardrossan canal.

He wrote the standard text for his profession, the "Comprehensive treatise on Land Surveying comprising the Theory and Practice of all its Branches".