Arthur H. Robinson (January 5, 1915 – October 10, 2004) was an American geographer and cartographer,[1] who was professor in the Geography Department at the University of Wisconsin–Madison from 1947 until he retired in 1980.

During World War II, Robinson served as director of the map division of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS).

[7] In 1947 Robinson subsequently joined the geography department at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he spent his career in academia and research.

His second wife was Martha Elizabeth Rodabaugh Phillips (1914–2010), a widow, with whom he had attended school in Oxford, Ohio.

Robinson was a prolific writer and influential philosopher on cartography:[7] According to Robinson, “the aim of cartographic design is to present the geographical data in such a fashion that the map, as a whole, appears as an integrated unit and so that each item included is clear, legible, and neither more nor less prominent than it should be.”[10] Like Richard Edes Harrison, another successful wartime cartographer, Robinson warned against the dangers of blindly accepting conventions in map design, such as always putting north at the top of the map.

In 1961, Rand McNally asked Robinson to choose a projection for use as a world map that, among other criteria, was uninterrupted,[13] had limited distortion, and was pleasing to the eye of general viewers.

Robinson proceeded through an iterative process to create a pseudo-cylindrical projection that intends to strike a compromise between distortions in areas and in distances, in order to attain a more natural visualization.