Shortly after my exciting and rewarding recovery of Point Whitehorn II 1858 last year, I felt challenged to find a marker that was even older than 145 years, which predated 1858, and had never been recovered by a Power Squadron member. Searching through the NOAA database, I came across my next challenge: PID TR2011, Designation Barnes 1854. This marker was monumented in 1853 by the CGS, was last witnessed in 1888 by the CGS, and their comments were brief, “Found old station with difficulty”. The 1854 description states “It is marked by a slight hole picked in the rocks, and by three holes picked around it”.
Located in the beautiful
On March 15th, I flew to
At 1030 hours, we’re tied off on a mooring buoy that Travis identified on a scouting trip earlier that week. Travis also took the time to identify the owner of this private property and was able to get permission to access this property. A few minutes after tying up, all three of us are on shore, thanks to a small dingy, and we pull out our datasheets and turn on our GPS’s. We then begin a short hike up an extremely steep hill, along a high sheer rock cliff above the waters edge, and through the mossy woods to the marker location. My WAAS GPS says we’re within 20 feet and we see where part of the rocky point has fallen into the water, and the rocks had experienced a lot of erosion over the years. Travis and Virgil immediately go to work and within minutes Virgil finds a small hole, and then Travis finds another small hole. Neither hole looks like a standard drill hole of that period, but they seem to offer some promise. We continue searching the rocky point and find another small hole and struggle with whether these are man made holes, or whether mother nature left them. Using the datasheet information, we line up the two peripheral holes and notice the first hole Virgil found could be TR2011. Travis makes a quick trip back to his boat and returns with a tape measure. Not only do these two points measure exactly as the datasheet describes, but we also find and identify the third peripheral marker hole. Once again, success is sweet and it was fun to share the excitement of finding this historic marker with two such fine individuals. Travis also brought their Squadron burgee with him, so we take the time to take a number of photographs documenting our success and excitement.
My Magellan 330M GPS was fully WAAS enabled and had all but one of all satellites locked in. I compared its readings to the 1853 survey results and think it’s worth sharing with you.
1853 Location Latitude N48 42.235’ Longitude W122 46.496’
2004 Location Latitude N48 42.236’ Longitude W122 46.497’
As a Civil Engineer and knowledgeable in both surveying equipment and surveying techniques, I can only marvel at the precision and accuracy of their work in 1853.
The NGS/NOAA database now shows the United States Power Squadrons recovered
TR2011 in March of 2004. It may now stand as the oldest
recovery, with the longest time span of any marker ever recovered in the Cooperative Charting
Program. The individual’s initials that accomplished
this are shown to be “TVC”. For Travis, Virgil, and
myself (Chris), our trip in the
D/Lt Chris H. Nelsen
District 21