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Surveying memories
I remember using an abney level, to chain up and down the mountains. I remember using a hand level, to carefully level the chain, to chain level. I remember using a kerosene oil lamp, with the chimney removed, to solder a sleeve patch, on the 200′ tape. I remember when I got to be stronger than my dad, and pull him off the chaining nails. I remember indexing the transit, and adjusting the cross hairs. I remember using a theodolite, and edm, on the top, and tweeking the return signal, and shooting distances. And, I remember shooting the vertical angle, to a point about 0.6′ below the prism, to make the vertical alignment of the telescope parallel to the vertical alignment of the edm.
I remember carrying a gallon can of sand, with a small bag of cement, and a nail, and brass disk, to put the name and number on the 3/4″ pipe.
I remember driving the 3/4″ pipe, and PULLING it back out, and turning it over, so that the plastic cap would go in the top. Beating the pipe, had messed the pipe up, so the cap would not go in it.
I remember carrying the transit, over my shoulder, from PC, to PT, and setting the R/W markers, in a subdivision, south of Coarsegold CA.
I remember pulling our stuck truck out, with chains, and cut down trees, for leverage.
I remember looking for a better way.
Then came GPS.VERY GOOD.
IF GPS had not come along, then I think we’d be using robots, with tracks, and built in Total Stations, Built in Prisms, and built in laser lights, where to set the corner.
I guess we are seeing the NEXT generation, that has NEVER used field books, (except for additional notes) and never used angles, and distances, to navigate for miles, with bilby towers. I never used a bilby tower.
Life is changing. I dug into an old traverse of ours the other day. surveyed the N 1/2 of a section. And additional tie line. My brother did it, when he was 16, with his buddy, who was maybe 17 at the time. Highest residual, was on a disturbed monument. 0.23′.Surveying. It’s a way of life. A calling, maybe.
Makes me want to go and get a burrito Grande, on town, after work. At the diner. “Order here, Pay here” at the counter.
Wow. time flies.
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50 Replies
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I remember when Starbucks, Subway and Walmart did not exist.
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I can remember reading books to figure out how things work and how to accomplish stuff.
If that wasn’t enough then I had to ask questions until I got a usable answer.
Had to learn by watching others or some other means because nobody was going to slow down at work.
Class, lectures, seminars and whatever it takes.
Had to learn that giving the client what they need is more than putting in billable hours.
It all takes considerable dedication to the profession.
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Holy Cow, post: 353563, member: 50 wrote: I remember when Starbucks, Subway and Walmart did not exist.
I remember when we had a choice of four TV stations, three brands of automobile (ignoring various subdivision brand names), two music recording speeds (45 and 33 rpm), and one phone company.
The phone had up to 8 parties on one line. Most people had seen a computer in a picture, but not in person, although they were familiar with 80-column punch cards, which you could fold, spindle, or mutilate if you wanted to be a troublemaker.
Back when we could buy more brands of gasoline in a small town than there were brands of car, drove 70 mph on state highways that seemed about 1.5 ft wider than two vehicles. There wasn’t a lot of difference between the design of an ambulance and a hearse, and with a high rate of accidents, that small difference didn’t matter much.
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I tell my grandsons ‘when I was a kid, telephones had to be wired to the wall and tvs didn’t…’
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paden cash, post: 353587, member: 20 wrote: I tell my grandsons ‘when I was a kid, telephones had to be wired to the wall and tvs didn’t…’
And TV turned itself off
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Where does Clark Kent change into Superman today?
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I remember telling a DOT surveyor who was trying to make me use a lock level and tape instead of a total station (I was a contractor and did not work for DOT) that I would gladly box my gun and pull out a level when he went to the grading contractor and convince him to use an ox and cart.
I remember going to the DOT office a couple of years later to pull plans and this man’s wife ran the plan room and she refused to give me the plans I needed because her husband said I was an “A-hole”…..
😀
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For Bill93:
“I remember when we had a choice of four TV stations, three brands of automobile (ignoring various subdivision brand names), two music recording speeds (45 and 33 rpm), and one phone company.
The phone had up to 8 parties on one line. Most people had seen a computer in a picture, but not in person, although they were familiar with 80-column punch cards, which you could fold, spindle, or mutilate if you wanted to be a troublemaker.
Back when we could buy more brands of gasoline in a small town than there were brands of car, drove 70 mph on state highways that seemed about 1.5 ft wider than two vehicles. There wasn’t a lot of difference between the design of an ambulance and a hearse, and with a high rate of accidents, that small difference didn’t matter much.”You were gifted and didn’t realize it. We had two TV stations until the late 60’s when ABC was available on a UHF channel. Agree with the three auto manufacturers so long as you didn’t count Studebaker. We never had a Ford on the place so it was really just two to choose from. One phone company, and it was strictly local. To call LONG DISTANCE, like more than 6 miles away, involved Central trying to connect with whatever little other local company was desired.
A computer was someone who could add numbers in their head. As for gasoline stations, Standard and Phillips 66 were the most common. On trips we would learn about odd ones like Derby, Hudson, Sinclair, Mobil and Conoco. No such thing as an am-boo-lance, just call the undertaker and he’d be out in a bit with his hearse. Sometimes he would get there before the doctor had arrived to confirm the death.
The three fastest forms of news distribution were telephone, telegraph and tell-a-woman. Remember when TV took a major change in primetime offerings with the addition of a show on Saturday evening called Saturday Night at the Movies. You could see a movie with out going to the theater! Wow! Everything was black/white/gray, the rest of the Crayola box was of no use to the TV stations.
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Holy Cow, post: 353644, member: 50 wrote: For Bill93:
“I remember when we had a choice of four TV stations, three brands of automobile (ignoring various subdivision brand names), two music recording speeds (45 and 33 rpm), and one phone company.
The phone had up to 8 parties on one line. Most people had seen a computer in a picture, but not in person, although they were familiar with 80-column punch cards, which you could fold, spindle, or mutilate if you wanted to be a troublemaker.
Back when we could buy more brands of gasoline in a small town than there were brands of car, drove 70 mph on state highways that seemed about 1.5 ft wider than two vehicles. There wasn’t a lot of difference between the design of an ambulance and a hearse, and with a high rate of accidents, that small difference didn’t matter much.”You were gifted and didn’t realize it. We had two TV stations until the late 60’s when ABC was available on a UHF channel. Agree with the three auto manufacturers so long as you didn’t count Studebaker. We never had a Ford on the place so it was really just two to choose from. One phone company, and it was strictly local. To call LONG DISTANCE, like more than 6 miles away, involved Central trying to connect with whatever little other local company was desired.
A computer was someone who could add numbers in their head. As for gasoline stations, Standard and Phillips 66 were the most common. On trips we would learn about odd ones like Derby, Hudson, Sinclair, Mobil and Conoco. No such thing as an am-boo-lance, just call the undertaker and he’d be out in a bit with his hearse. Sometimes he would get there before the doctor had arrived to confirm the death.
The three fastest forms of news distribution were telephone, telegraph and tell-a-woman. Remember when TV took a major change in primetime offerings with the addition of a show on Saturday evening called Saturday Night at the Movies. You could see a movie with out going to the theater! Wow! Everything was black/white/gray, the rest of the Crayola box was of no use to the TV stations.
Wow Holy, I had no idea you were raised a Democrat…
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50/50 My parents tended to cancel each other’s votes.
Not certain exactly how you arrived at your conclusion, Paden. Please elucidate for the common folks. Was it the reference to the am-boo-lance?
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Holy Cow, post: 353563, member: 50 wrote: I remember when Starbucks, Subway and Walmart did not exist.
When I was a kid there were no such things as “Malls” and television set tubes were round. :woot:
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Holy Cow, post: 353658, member: 50 wrote: 50/50 My parents tended to cancel each other’s votes.
Not certain exactly how you arrived at your conclusion, Paden.
“We never had a Ford on the place….” ..according to Pops Cash, only Republicans and Communists drove Fords…True story. To be honest, I have owned a Ford or two. But that was after Pops had left this Earth!
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Now, that’s funny, it don’t matter who you are. I had never heard that one before.
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paden cash, post: 353653, member: 20 wrote: Wow Holy, I had no idea you were raised a Democrat…
[MEDIA=youtube]RWpU8sX10_4[/MEDIA]
I hope everyone has a great day; I know I will! -
I remember visiting Dad at the office in the mid 1960s; he had a desktop Marchand calculator. It added and subtracted, not sure if it multiplied and divided. When that thing computed it rumbled and clash-crashed, sounded like numbers were being tortured. I remember being mistified that he had to look up the answer in a thick book.
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Dave Karoly, post: 353684, member: 94 wrote: I remember visiting Dad at the office in the mid 1960s; he had a desktop Marchand calculator. It added and subtracted, not sure if it multiplied and divided. When that thing computed it rumbled and clash-crashed, sounded like numbers were being tortured. I remember being mistified that he had to look up the answer in a thick book.
Frank Speary & Arlie Byce, circa 1973, had one with a hand crank and a hand flip lever they would put on the hood of the truck and churn computations in the field.
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A Harris, post: 353686, member: 81 wrote: Frank Speary & Arlie Byce, circa 1973, had one with a hand crank and a hand flip lever they would put on the hood of the truck and churn computations in the field.
Dad’s was electric. My last employer had a portable Monroe calculator and at least one nearly new condition Curta.
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Hippies. I remember hippies. The real thing, not those cheap wannabe’s they show on TV these days. Make love, not war. Groovy, baby. Bellbottoms.
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gschrock, post: 353592, member: 556 wrote: Paden, speaking of phones – have restored some old ones, and got a few to work with the present phone system. The crank phone on the right works and the sound quality is quite good (cheated a bit – there is a keypad inside to do the pulses). My kids used to impress their friends with it. Am working on the dial phone to work wireless, as with an old rail phone. If’n ya run across any obscure old phones, let me know….
I have seen type of phone on the right used before…but it was for illicit activities along the local bayous and ponds
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That’s all that was available in our neighborhood until about late 1960. Ma Bell wasn’t interested in large chunks of rural America. She wanted the easy money that comes from dense people.;-)
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