In 1931, an out-of-work draughtsman named Harry Beck sketched a new map of the London Underground in his spare time. It used straight lines, 45-degree angles and evenly spaced stations, and it ignored geography almost entirely. The Underground rejected it as too revolutionary. A year later they printed 750,000 copies, and it still wasn’t enough.

Beck was paid ten guineas. He spent the next three decades revising the map on a handshake agreement he believed made it his, until London Transport replaced his design in 1960 without telling him. This is the story of the map, the man who drew it, and his long fight to get it back.

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