CacheBar

I managed to find a page with the history of the Mississippi River Commission (whew, 5 double letters in two words!) It can be found at this Corps of Engineers site. This Mississippi River Commission set out to survey the entire length of the Mississippi after a couple of severe floods in 1849 and 1850. One of the supporters of this measure was Representative James A. Garfield, who later became president. Another future president of the U.S, Benjamin Harrison, was appointed to the first commission when it was established in 1879. I'll have to do a more extensive search and see if I can find any more of these 113 year old pipecaps.

Thanks for the helpful and useful information CallawayMT. I found the simularity between the pipecaps we've found very interesting. I will do further reasearch on the Mississippi River Commission and will post if I find anything of further interest. And thanks Jeff for your kind remarks. I appreciate them. I don't have any friends that share this hobby, and when I try to discuss it with others, they quickly get that glazed over look and I realize they're not quite getting it. So it's nice to have encouragement from others who have the "bug". Here's a close up picture of the 1891 pipecap.

Well, the age of your benchmark truly is impressive. Congratulations! It kind of takes a little of the wind out of my sails, as I just found my oldest benchmark yet. There are only two pipecaps in my region that I'm aware of. They were both stamped "Mississippi River Commission 1891" I found one in the middle of winter, in the snow, and after climbing and sliding around a perilous and VERY steep cliff to reach it. Once I'd found it though, it was only the pipe, the cap was long gone. So the other day, I found another pipecap that must have been set at the same time. I excitedly set out to find it, this time on a great summer day. I managed to find it, and EUREKA! the pipecap was still attached and intact. The NGS data sheet reported that the Power Squadron had reported this one as "not found" in 2003, so it was doubly enjoyable to find it. You can view my log and pictures of this pipecap at MG0644/Marias Ossier The data sheet also lists this one as having been "monumented" in 1931. Many of the benchmarks I've found in the area were placed in 1931 as well. Does this mean that the pipecap itself was actually placed in 1931? Or was it placed earlier, in 1891 as the cap says, and simply officially recorded in 1931? Any guesses would be appreciated.

I'd be fairly certain that the pipe you found was indeed the station you were seeking. For reference, see the 1891 pipecap I recently found on top of a bluff. (Actually, that is misleading, as the actual cap is apparently long gone) 1891 pipecap MG0670

Hi, Hope this post isn't too late. But the NGS website has a feature which allows you to find any station in the US with several ways of searching, by PID, station name, county, USGS Quad, etc. It is contantly updated, so it should be very up to date. You can start your search on this page: http://www.ngs.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/datasheet.prl

Thanks Elias .... for the work you do to help provide this greatly appreciated service. Relieved to find out that it wasn't on my end. But unfortunately, I also installed MS's NET framework and some SQL server stuff and some MDAC files before finding that it wasn't a problem on my end. Guess they won't hurt much, and things seem to be working OK, but I'll try to "undo" whatever I can to preserve space. Thanks again for getting on the problem.

Starting tonight (12-16-03 12:30 a.m. CST) I'm unable to view the geocache.com maps showing cache locations. For instance, when on a cache page, if I click on the link to show it on the geocaching.com map, I get the following error: Server Error in '/' Application. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Server was unable to process request. --> Unspecified error Description: An unhandled exception occurred during the execution of the current web request. Please review the stack trace for more information about the error and where it originated in the code. Exception Details: System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapException: Server was unable to process request. --> Unspecified error Source Error: An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below. Stack Trace: [soapException: Server was unable to process request. --> Unspecified error] System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapHttpClientProtocol.ReadResponse(SoapClientMessage message, WebResponse response, Stream responseStream, Boolean asyncCall) +1496 System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapHttpClientProtocol.Invoke(String methodName, Object[] parameters) +218 Geocaching.com.Groundspeak.mapper.Service1.getMap(Double mapCenterX, Double mapCenterY, Int64 scale, Int32 imageHeight, Int32 imageWidth, clsWayPoints wayPoints, clsMapFiles mapFiles) +234 Geocaching.UI.bmapper_getmap.GenerateMap() +2574 Geocaching.UI.bmapper_getmap.ProcessPageLoad() +492 Geocaching.UI.bmapper_getmap.Page_UserLoggedIn(Object sender, EventArgs e) +80 Geocaching.UI.WebformBase.IsLoggedIn() +1089 Geocaching.UI.bmapper_getmap.Page_Load(Object sender, EventArgs e) +275 System.Web.UI.Control.OnLoad(EventArgs e) +67 System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +35 System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain() +753 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Version Information: Microsoft .NET Framework Version:1.1.4322.573; ASP.NET Version:1.1.4322.573 Anyone else having this problem, or is it just on my end? Has anyone else encountered this problem, and if so, do they have a fix? Hope you can help. Yours, Cachebar

I think that's a great idea. I just spent hours on line searching for surplus ammo boxes. Of course, the shipping is what kills, so I'm going to have to poke around locally and see what I can find. I didn't find any water-tight plastic containers however, other than a couple plastic ammo boxes that were too large for my purposes. I personally would really appreciate a place where members could trade notes on where they've found good deals on goodies needed for geocaching.