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LA SIERRA RM 3


Shorelander

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Sharp eyes, Shorelander.

 

Please tell me the little-used penalty of $250 will be exacted from the seller. "We don't know how we got this" indeed! May he be hung by his thumbs from that last-remaining Bilby tower in LA until bitten to death by mosquitos....

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I sent the seller a nastygram and reported a listing violation to ebay.

 

Edit: the listing is still up. It wouldn't hurt for some other folks to file a report against this item (at the bottom of the ebay listing page "Report This Item).

 

Re-edit: This evening the listing has been removed.

Edited by Bill93
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If the photo taken by a geocacher in 2007 is, as stated, the location of RM 3, then the one for sale on eBay can't be that one, because the stem of the one that's for sale is intact. Yet it seems like it must be that one, and not an earlier one, because the one for sale is stamped both 1928 and 1968, and there's no record of any new placements since 1968. Yet again, the monumentation report from 1968 makes no mention of an existing RM 3 from 1928, simply stating that one was "established" at that time. So the eBay seller may be claiming (and may even be correct) that this disk is not mentioned on the data sheet for DX3874.

 

What is NGS's official position on the sale of old survey marks, especially if their provenance is murky or unknown?

 

Patty

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...because the one for sale is stamped both 1928 and 1968, and there's no record of any new placements since 1968. Yet again, the monumentation report from 1968 makes no mention of an existing RM 3 from 1928, simply stating that one was "established" at that time. So the eBay seller may be claiming (and may even be correct) that this disk is not mentioned on the data sheet for DX3874...

Since it's a reset wouldn't it be established with 1929 and 1968 stamped on it as it states in the stamping? Since there wasn't an RM3, then the one in the photograph must be the one they established in 1968, right?

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The data sheet says RM3 was set in 1968 and the box score puts it about 0.92 meter =3.01 ft westerly from the destroyed RM1

DX3874| CC4057 LA SIERRA RM 1 6.258 METERS 174 18 |

DX3874| CC4059 LA SIERRA RM 3 6.144 METERS 182 43 |

 

So the photo might be of the stem of RM1. The rock looks somewhat "fragmented" as noted and it doesn't say if the stem was gone. The log does not mention RM1 so could have them confused.

 

While it is true that if a surveyor has a bucket of disks that are officially categorized as destroyed, it would cause no direct harm to sell them, any commerce in used disks increases the likelihood that someone will rip off a good disk in order to collect or sell it.

 

The NGS official position is that a destroyed disk must be returned to them and they can't give anyone permission to keep it. In practice they don't insist on the return in most cases, and know that surveyors and even benchmark hunters keep souvenirs. But I think they would not be pleased to see them sold.

 

Edit: add box score

Edited by Bill93
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Several of us here at NGS watch the on-line auction site and if we see a USC&GS or NGS disk listed we send an email to the seller explaining the significance of the disk and ask them politely to remove it. If they don't, then we send an email to the auction site asking them to remove the item.

 

GeorgeL

NGS

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