More Archaeological Digs for 1938 and 1940
There is a very sophisticated piece of equipment commercially sold under the name of “shovel” or “spade” that one should expect to find remarkably useful in the resurveying of boundaries.
One of the tasks for the afternoon was to locate a pipe set in 1938 that was the common corner of an adjoining subdivision laid out and platted in 1940 by the same engineer/surveyor. At first impression, the original pipe was missing. After all, LoupGarou Surveying had set one of their rod and cap monuments within about half a foot of the calculated position. So, clearly their rod and cap was important “evidence” of where the corner was, right? It was set in 2006, so by now it would be impossible to ignore, yes?
Well, the ordinary procedure, i.e. pull the LoupGarou rod and cap and use metal detector to search for original pipe, wouldn’t work in this location. One of the landowners had hired Bethlehem Steel as his landscapers. The bed edging was probably 3/4-inch plate and there were lots of other ferrous bits and pieces installed with it.
So, I explained to the adjoining landowner why I needed to dig in his planting bed for a 1938-vintage pipe that was probably about 24 inches below grade and (pro forma) asked if he minded. He was obliging, so we turned the “spade” loose on the theoretical coordinates of the corner. Within the first minute of “digging” (as it is called) we turned up the top of a very rusty 3/8-inch rebar about 0.32 ft. away from the LoupGarou rod and cap.
Well, the 3/8-inch rebar wasn’t of a pattern made in 1938 and in any event the 1938 surveyor said that he’d set an “iron pipe” there. So I reactivated the “spade” with the depth sensor set to “about 24 inches”. At 20 inches, that amazing tool found an old iron pipe that in fact the 3/8 in. rebar had been driven into. That original pipe was 0.49 ft. distant horizontally from the LoupGarou rod and cap.
As a courtesy, I knocked on the landowner’s door and asked him whether he’d like to see the 1938-vintage pipe that was the corner of his lot. That was an interesting conversation that followed when he noted that it looked like his landscapers had done a better job of locating the steel bed edging on the lot line than LoupGarou Surveying had done.
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