"Honey War"

There are some things I disagree with in that article.

First off, most of the 9 miles was not due to a surveying problem as one might gather from the headline.

It was a difference as to which interpretation to use for the definition of the line. Sullivan's 1816 line was based on the wording of a treaty with the Osage Indians. The wording in the creation of the state of Missouri and the Iowa Territory was ambiguous in reference to points on the rivers, as mentioned in the article, and the 1836 survey used the northernmost interpretation.

Furthermore, Sullivan's northward tilt gave Missouri an extra 2 or 3 miles at it's eastern end, when the matter was finally adjudicated, relative to a constant latitude line -- so that in no way contributed to the dispute. His sloppiness was NOT ignoring the magnetic declination as stated in the article, it was setting the declination at the beginning of his line and not updating it as he worked eastward.

I'm not sure where the author got the name "Booth line" ,as I have usually seen it named for the man who ran it - respected Missouri surveyor Joseph C. Brown, as mentioned in the article.

The photo showing "Start of the Sullivan Line" actually shows the cast iron monument placed by the 1850 resurvey of Sullivan's line as ordered by the Supreme Court. They found evidence of other mile markers left by Sullivan, but had to extrapolate to this point. The other item in the photo is an "historical marker" stone.

The article says the Sullivan line was resurveyed "one more time" and marked with stone monuments. Actually, the 1850 resurvey placed cast iron monuments every 10 miles. Decades later one portion of the line was resurveyed and marked with mile stones.