I read this as the lines are not parallel and some are at 12°30'E and other is at 10°30'W because of an additional 34.45chains on a boundary
> You can think of it as just another way of reporting a bearing.
Yes, that's a good way to put it, Jerry. Operationally, it's also probably easier and more consistent to set off some variation to the nearest one or five minutes and run a line with the needle on the "South" graduation of the compass circle than it would be to estimate, say a reading of S12°20'W on a circle graduated to the nearest 0°15'.
I think that it is important to understand the context of any survey such as this one.
Cherry County Nebraska is the largest county, by far, in the state, and is larger than the state of Connecticut. It is so large that it is in two time zones. But even today it contains fewer than 6,200 people. We need to know that in order to know what to expect from this survey.
It is axiomatic that the value of the land will be reflected in the cost and quality of the survey. And that is the way it is today, with the exception of state survey regulations which provide a higher floor, in theory, for any survey.
In the 1800's, County Surveyors held a public office, but were largely hired and paid privately for their work. Five dollars a day (for actual field work) was the norm.
There also seems to be some misunderstanding about how the PLSS was actually run initially. Say for example our Deputy Surveyor has run North on the line between sections 27 and 26 and has set the section corner common to sections 22, 23, 26, and 27. He is the instructed to head east (on a compass bearing defined for that section by the Surveyor General) on a random line and set a temporary quarter post at the half mile mark. He is then to continue east until he intersects the section corner common to sections 25, 26, 35, and 36. At that point he is instructed to note the error of closure to the north or south, and to the east and west. He is instructed to return to the temporary quarter post, but not by a "corrected" bearing, but by the reciprocal bearing.
When he returns to the temporary quarter post he is instructed to set it permanently north or south, east or west, by one-half of the misclosure at the eastern section corner, and note any bearing trees. No big mystery. The senior monumentation controls the line.
>not by a "corrected" bearing, but by the reciprocal bearing.
There are interesting minor differences between times and places. Typical GLO notes from Iowa in 1847 read as:
East Random bet Secs. 15 &22 Var 9 50 E
80.50 Intersect N & S line 30 L S of post
West Corrected bet secs 15 & 22 Var 10 3 E
40.25 set post quarter sec in mound
80.50 section corner
Note that 30 links in 80 chains calculates to slightly less than 13 minutes, which is the adjustment he made to his variation setting. Accurately done, this will take him back to the NW corner of the section he is completing.
Bill
Good point.
But my comment was how the PLSS was run initially and I hope that the point was understood. I'm not sure where the averaging or adjusting of the compass bearings came into the instructions but millions of us live in the PLSS surveyed prior to that.
My theme was that the time and the context of the original survey are always important in any later analysis.
But this was not a case of going out and correcting back. The variations are given for locational purpose but are not actual differing variations for differing time periods.
Very unclear way of reporting the direction of a line, but it's clear the surveyor ran a line from a plan section corner on the south to a plan quarter corner on the north, and called it the section line.
Who won the court battle? Sounds like they went back to plan and defeated this survey.
> But this was not a case of going out and correcting back. The variations are given for locational purpose but are not actual differing variations for differing time periods.
>
> Very unclear way of reporting the direction of a line ...
Yes, but that was not uncommonly done with compass surveys. The main novelty is just the magnitude of the variation difference. I'd describe it as sort of functional equivalent of a custom map projection that allowed a surveyor to report all lines as running record with the metadata being the actual variation required for a particular line.
