Welcome! 

I have to begin by confessing that I am neither a land surveyor nor an expert-on anything-just ask my wife! I am, however, a historian and a mathematician with a passionate interest in geodetic surveying and cartography. That passion has produced a series of articles which this magazine has been kind enough to publish. Those articles were, in part, the basis for a book entitled Longitude by Wire: Finding North America, which will be published by the University of South Carolina Press in April of next year. I hope that this forum will provide a virtual gathering place where those of us who are interested in these topics, can learn more. I have just begun work on another book that will deal with American contributions to the definition of the figure of the Earth. That will require me to tackle gravimetric geodesy for the first time and, boy, do I need help with that one!

Richard

Borden, Simeon. “Account of a Trigonometrical Survey of Massachusetts, by Simeon Borden, Esq., with a Comparison of its Results with those obtained from Astronomical Observations, by Robert Treat Paine, Esq., communicated by Mr Borden,” Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, held at Philadelphia, for Promoting Useful Knowledge: New Series 9:33–91. Philadelphia: Philosophical Society, 1846.

This is a complete account of the first trigonometrical survey of an American state--Massachussets. I hope it's useful.

Richard

Just thought you might want to hear a little story based on your passion as stated above. I was going over a government map and field notes from the mid 1800's and noticed where the surveyor had noted a distance to which he had crossed into a certain ladies 5 acre parcel at so many chains from the section corner. This was in a rather remote area by today's standards near a prominent river but far off the beaten path. As I shuffled the aerial across my desk a perfectly square
area of different vegetation stood out like a sore thumb. I threw the scale down on the aerial and sure enough it was this ladies parcel from 150 years prior. I never made it out there on the ground but it sure makes me wonder what tools are lying under the dirt. Also on the same government map I noticed a strange figure of some kind but no mention of it in the notes. It was circular with triangles around the edges with the tops of the triangles pointing to the center of the circle. There was a small inner circle also. I asked people what they thought it was but we all just scratched our heads. Then WHAM! it hit me like a brick. I was looking down on an Indian encampment and the triangles were teepee's with a large common area in the center!! With a magnifying glass I saw what I believed to be smoke billowing out of the teepee's. It was like I was watching an old Indian village come to life on a 2 inch square copy of an old map!! It is a neat feeling when something like that comes together. Also I thought it would be of interest to you that in the 36 years I have been surveying in Florida I have found two of Henry Washington's survey posts.(Henry was George's nephew). One just last year! and it still had the scribes of the section numbers on it.(barely visible but visible none the less).
Hope you enjoyed the post and nice talking to you.....Tom