alt Hacker NewsPastmaps might be what you're thinking of? They have an archive of the maps that the United States Geological Survey used to serve as their Historical Topographic Map Collection.
Pastmaps might be what you're thinking of? They have an archive of the maps that the United States Geological Survey used to serve as their Historical Topographic Map Collection.
USGS has this on their topoview site:
https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/topoview/viewer/
Pick the area you want to look at, select a historical topo map, and click the Show button. Then you can use the Transparency slider to see the topo map overlaid on a current street map.
You can discover some interesting things this way. For example, I used to live on Hawthorne Avenue in Palo Alto (CA). The 1897 topo map shows that this street was originally a railroad spur line off the main Southern Pacific track (now used by Caltrain and freight). This spur line turned left onto what is now Middlefield and then turned right to serve the Catholic University (now St. Patrick's Seminary).