Recovering a benchmark

[+Student Camper]

I may have an opportunity to search for and possibly recover a very old benchmark that was monumented in 1887.

It is not marked by a disc but by a pile of stones and a buried jar,

My issue is, if I were to go and recover this mark, I would have to dig for the jar to verify the find,

doing so would most likely cause some disturbance to the mark if not destroying it altogether.

I'm sure some of you could offer some guidance?, or perhaps I should pass on this in the interest of preservation of the historical value.

What say you?

[+LSUFan]

I would have to dig for the jar to verify the find,

doing so would most likely cause some disturbance to the mark if not destroying it altogether.

I'm sure some of you could offer some guidance?, or perhaps I should pass on this in the interest of preservation of the historical value.

What say you?

 

The fact that you are asking for others opinion, is a good sign that you know this one has historical importance and care about it's preservation. I would never attempt to recover one like this on my own, strictly for the reasons you have stated. You would need professional help on this one, and that could be very satisfying in itself, seeing if you could secure this required help.

 

I would advise contacting someone at your state surveying board, and definitely dropping DaveD (Dave Doyle) and NGS Surveyor (George Leigh)who both work for the NGS an email, explaining this. I'm sure they can get you in contact with the appropriate professionals who are needed (actually required) for this type of recovery.

 

There is a great article linked somewhere on these forums, where the professionals did a recovery on a jug/bottle....with all the painstaking effort it took to recover it...and replace it as it was. Once you see what it entails, you will see that this kind of recovery is definitely for the pros.

 

Maybe someone can provide the link to it.

EDIT: Here is the article:

 

http://www.penryfamily.com/surveying/councilhill.html

 

Bobby

Edited March 7, 2011 by LSUFan

[+Panda Inc]

With something so delicate and historical I would definitely hunt for it. If a mound of stone were still there I would not disturb it, only photograph it and the views North, South, East and West then contact the NGS as LSUFan suggests. If they are interested in taking a field trip to the site .... offer to be their guide. If they accept, take along a local Boy or Girl Scout Troup. Could be fun and educational for all.

 

Cheers

Panda Inc

[TillaMurphs]

Try to avoid duplicating the results of the 1934 crew when they were looking for ACORN.

 

Good luck to you!

[+Student Camper]

Try to avoid duplicating the results of the 1934 crew when they were looking for ACORN.

 

Good luck to you!

Precisely why I asked these questions,

in this case, there are no reference marks and because of the location, the pile of rocks would not likely be found after 124 years, but it would be fun to go see.

[Wintertime]

In addition to the people whom Bobby suggested that you contact, Kurt (CallawayMT) is a professional surveyor who has lots of experience with finding old underground survey points. Here's a posting he made a few months ago in a discussion of a buried earthenware object:

 

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=263793&view=findpost&p=4533225

[CallawayMT]

Thanks for the nod Patty.

 

Floyd - just looking in your area; I see Dig 1909 which was not found years ago, but could possibly still be there. If the station you are looking for is like this one, it is buried in a a beach and covered by a rock pile. This is a circumstance where if you choose to go looking; I would not probe. Chances are you would just bust the bottle and not even know it. If it is beach; just try slowly and carefully digging down through the sand.

 

Here is a recovery story that square nail and I went after a few years ago. We were looking for some 1904 reference monument bottles on a station that we had both already recovered, but did not know about the bottles until a later date.

Station Coulee Reference Bottles

I do want to mention that we replaced the bottles into their original positions for future searchers to find. We even placed rebar alongside the bottles to make them easier to find. There really is no survey value to these bottles, but they do have a "wow" historical factor to them. This is a case where an earlier post asked about NOT identifying a find like this just so that treasure seekers would not go looking. There probably is some real value in this case for not identifying, but all of the information is already of record; so I can't see not updating the records. If there are people like that out there, then they will find what they want to steal.

 

Happy safe hunting,

Kurt

Edited March 13, 2011 by CallawayMT

[Bill93]

It might be worth mentioning the techniques you used to assure the bottles were left in their original positions, and to what accuracy you could do that.

 

If you just dig up a bottle and put it back "about there" then much of any survey value it had has been lost.

 

Even if the old coordinates of a particular point are not of current interest, it might serve as a calibration between the datum of the day, as realized in that region, and current values. That is difficult information to find.

[+Student Camper]

The mark in question, I'm not going to reveal it at this time, is quite similar to DIG 1909, the main difference is that it is not buried under a heavy industrial complex and there is a remote chance of recovery.

I have plenty of time to research and make plans as how to best approach this project, possibly even making an exploratory trip, it is in a remote location, to get the lay of the land so to speak.

I expect it to be a year or more before an attempt to recover.

We don't have the "sandy" beaches that are normally associated with the ocean but are more of a mixture of sand and coarse gravel that would not conducive to using a probe, so digging would be the only option.

I am going to talk with the people at NGS as well.

As CallawayMT may already suspect, it is only accessible by boat or floatplane, anyone want to join me?

As you know, I am new at this and find it exciting to think I might have a chance to find something like this, this summer, as soon as the weather and time permits, I will be looking for closer and less exciting marks, there are a lot of them in my area.

Thanks to all of you for the input,

Floyd

Edited March 13, 2011 by student camper

[CallawayMT]

It might be worth mentioning the techniques you used to assure the bottles were left in their original positions, and to what accuracy you could do that.

 

If you just dig up a bottle and put it back "about there" then much of any survey value it had has been lost.

 

Even if the old coordinates of a particular point are not of current interest, it might serve as a calibration between the datum of the day, as realized in that region, and current values. That is difficult information to find.

 

Standard referencing of the bottles was accomplished by placing nails at approximately 90 degrees from each other with measured distances to the bottle. The bottles went back at approximately 0.01' from their original positions. As listed in the recovery report, one of the bottles was out of position by about 4-5 degrees from record. If I would have been concerned about the positions, I would have set up a total station and tied the center of each bottle as well as the station.

 

This is a third order station and of very little survey value, much more historical value than survey, but all of these stations should be treated with the best of care. Even if the station were pushed over and out of postion; it would still be useable for a historical datum calibration. A few tenths out of position would still be good enough to use for calibration, but obviously the more accurate the better.

 

Floyd, I would join you on your excursion if I could, but probably won't make it to the Ketchikan area for awhile. I will actually be up in Anchorage in a few weeks to take the Alaska Land Surveyor's exam. I hope to meet up with NorthWes, but realize there will still be a lot of snow making any good recoveries in the brush a difficult exercise to say the least.

 

Kurt

[+billwallace]

... but did not know about the bottles until a later date.

...

Where did you find the USGS triangulation book??

[CallawayMT]

... but did not know about the bottles until a later date.

...

Where did you find the USGS triangulation book??

Just searching around in Google Books.

[+dukeofurl01]

Hmm. Want to provide the link?

[+billwallace]

... but did not know about the bottles until a later date.

...

Where did you find the USGS triangulation book??

Just searching around in Google Books.

hmmm ... amazing what you can find in there

[+dukeofurl01]

Hmm, I searched Google Books for "USGS triangulation book" and also without the quotes, didn't get a solid hit, instead got many tiny hits with the word triangulation in them.

[CallawayMT]

Hmm, I searched Google Books for "USGS triangulation book" and also without the quotes, didn't get a solid hit, instead got many tiny hits with the word triangulation in them.

I actually stumbled on it while doing research on the Missouri River Commission: Primary Triangulation