ksd823

Google Earth Version 4.0.2737 In the past I have been able to create a PocketQuery using Google Earth to make a route that was created from multiple route segments. This is to create a route from Point A to Point D that passes through Point B and Point C even though Google Earth sees no reason to go there. The way I have done this in the past is to create directions in Google Earth from A -> B, B -> C, C -> D then place all of them in a folder, save the Folder as a KML, and then upload to Geocaching.com as a route. All three segments would show up - check all three - receive an informational warning about combining the route, then I would get a Route that was from A -> D passing through B and C. This seems to have changed - not sure why. Now when I follow this procedure I get a route that appears to be in preview to be... A -> B A (as crow flies to) B -> C A (as crow files to) B (as crow flies) C -> D So if each segment was 100 miles, the total route mileage would be 600 for the combined route and the caches are all over the place since they are both on the crow flies and the road path. HELP! Am I just doing something completely wrong - or was I taking advantage of an undocumented feature in the past? Is there a better way to do what I am trying to do?

Found this while taking reading for a trail in Cleburne State Park (Cleburne, TX). I had never run across this type of mark before but from the low number I would assume that it is a reference to a park map or plat. The trail we were charting runs close to the park boundary, so this is likely a survey mark for that boundary.

Texas Historic Markers has entered Peer Review. Please take a moment to add your support for this new category. A copy of the details are included below. This is a category that can collect a large number of entries - there are Historic Markers in almost every town in Texas. No matter if you are a lifelong Texan or just visiting the Great State of Texas, you can learn something new. Please take a moment to vote today - don't wait till later!

To update all on the Officer Vote to Approve Category here are the results: Vote to approve group's category (Texas Historical Markers): Successful Now on to the next stage!

Simpler works for me - I would like to see lots of people take advantage of logging and setting the waymarks. From the discussion it's clear that more info will likely result in less participation.

Well - it looks like we have a leader and two officers now. The next step should be to "3. Fill out the category submission form on your Group page" (from the FAQ page). With luck we can have this in peer review next week

I agree - althought we might consider logging condition and seeing if the state would accept reports from waymarkers on markers that are not in good shape or have been damaged. I know that the benchmarking groups have had some success in having their efforts help out the USGS. Photos I think are the way to go. We would need to make sure that every initial entry has a baseline photo to compare against. Should it be a requirement that you include the GPS in the photo? A couple of other field that might be good to have is that subject field - if we can get the key and change it to readable text. That would help people who want to use this for education or trip planning. And then a personal favorite of mine - if the marker is on the route of the Texas Historic Trails system (like the Forts Trail, etc). (Edit to correct some of my spelling errors)

This group has it's work cut out for it. There are 12,456 lines in the spreadsheet I pulled from the Texas Historical Commission database, and even if there are a few blanks, that's a lot of markers. Here are the fields of info that THC maintaines in their database. I would guess that we would want to take that as a starting point for information we would collect. Comments after the field names are mine. markernum - appears to be a serial number system, don't know if it appears on the marker. atlas_number - System generated master database number title - Title from the marker indexname - A version of the title for indexing "The Important Place" would be "Important Place, The" address city - Single line repersentation of the address, not broken by city state zip county - County of location utm_zone - You likely can guess this - not all have them - an opportunity for us to help? utm_east - utm_north - code - Appear to be a subject matter code, have not located key yet year - Year marker was placed ? rthl - ? loc_desc - A text field with directions size - Size of the marker repaircom - Comments on the condition of the marker repairdate - no data in this field comments - appears to refer to the ticket that placed it or other internal notes markertext - Text of the marker, have not verified if summary or full text rthlcond - Appears to refer to the condition of the structure or item the marker refers to if there is one And here is a sample of their database output. Marker Number: 168 Marker Title: Andrews County Discovery Well Index Entry: Andrews County Discovery Well Address: City: County: Andrews UTM Zone: 13 UTM Easting: 720424 UTM Northing: 3579690 Subject Codes: OL; Year Marker Erected: 1965 Designations: na Marker Location: From Andrews, take Hwy. 87 West about 5 miles Marker Size: 18" x 28" Subject Repairs Completed: N/A Marker Text: C. E. Ogden No. 1, producing 200 barrels a day from San Andres lime formation was brought in, Dec. 1929, by Deep Rock Oil Co.--the Andrews County discovery well and first of 730 wells in Fuhrman-Masco oil field. Bought, Feb. 1932, by Tripplehorn brothers, of Fort Worth. Has now pumped for more than 35 years. Since 1956, Andrews has been top producing county in Texas and U. S. Fuhrman-Masco field has produced 55 million barrels of oil--its contribution to total of more than a billion barrels for Andrews County in May, 1965. (1965)

Well - if anyone has read this far in the thread - take a a quick visit to the group membership page and join the group to promote a category for Texas Historic Markers. Group Membership Page - Visit to Join To learn more about how Texas designates Historical Sites, please visit the FAQ Page of the Texas Historical Commission. One thing I learned there is that there are four types of designations. I am not sure how to do it, but we should likely record those designations in the waymark entries that will come.

First step is to create a Group with a leader and two officers. I would be glad to be part of a group for documenting the Historical Markers in Texas.