Oregon began licensing land surveyors on March 10, 1944, with LS #1 being assigned to W.C. Galloway (who also was PE #44, from the first class of licensed engineers in 1919).
Galloway was born on March 30, 1886 and died in 1949. He served as the Benton County Oregon Surveyor from 1913 until 1936. I??ve read that he was known for using glass quart bottles to mark his corners. Any surveyor who drinks his whiskey by the quart and is honored with the first LS number in the state is OK in my book. Historically, license numbers are given out alphabetically by last name but it appears the first ??class? of both engineers and surveyors were awarded numbers in accordance to their reputations, popularity or notoriety. Olaf Laurgaard was PE #1 in 1919. Highly acclaimed engineer, a member of the legislature and respected by all. Except me. I??ve got some issues with Olaf.
Every year Oregon surveyors were issued licenses in consecutive numbers, with some milestones in numbering being:
LS?ÿ?ÿ?ÿ?ÿ 1?ÿ ?ÿ?ÿ3/10/1944: W.C. Galloway, Corvallis, Ore.
LS ?ÿ100 ?ÿ?ÿ1/1/1945: Arthur LeGault, Portland, Ore.
LS ?ÿ500 ?ÿ5/13/1960: Robert Martin, West Linn, Ore.
LS 1000 7/13/1973: Wayne Hardy, Olympia, Wa.
LS 1500 10/28/1977: Theodor Gump, Corvallis, Ore
LS 2000 ?ÿ?ÿ7/16/1982: Donald McLane, Springfield, Ore
The numbering continued in this fashion and was rocketing toward 3000?ÿ licenses until the class of 1999 when the licensing board in Oregon went to a 5 digit random numbering system. It??s kind of kooky. The first LS in 1999 is LS 38,843. The next is 41,486 followed by 42,649. The number pool is shared with engineers. In other words, if you are LS 44,444 and then 5 years later you get your PE, it will be PE 44,444. I??m sure it makes sense to someone, somewhere. A single random 5 digit number for every person who pays fees to the board. Great for bean counters at least.
I don??t imagine many double digit surveyors are practicing on this side of the grass anymore and I know of one triple digit licensee in my area who occasionally dabbles in doing a bit of surveying (LS 920 issued 7/17/1970). Mid-range 1000 LS numbers are few, issued around 40 years ago. With the new 1999 system it??s hard to gauge a surveyors years of licensed experience unless you can crack the board??s Enigma Code. Luckily an Oregon surveyor??s stamp has the date of issue on it so you can get an idea if LS 98,765 is working on the first or 500th survey of a long and storied career.
Some other background for tonight??s quiz:
53 LS licenses were issued in the class of ??44. Moving along into the last quarter of the 20th century 41 were issued in 1976 and then in 1977 it was a good year to own stock in the rubber stamp company because 432 were issued. 1978 was also a good crop with 199 licenses issued. Then in 1979 the numbers were down to 66 LS licenses. My class of 1989 has 46 alumni. I don??t dare to guess how many were issued in 2017 in Oregon. A handful?
Time for the quiz. Clear your desk and pick up your pencils:
Question 1 ?? what the hell happened in 1977/1978 to make such a jump in licensees?
Question 2 ?? Who was the Oregon surveyor who was issued the last 4 digit LS number in the state before the craziness of the class of ??99 five digit numbering? The ??broke the mold? surveyor?
Question 2 ?? Who was the Oregon surveyor who was issued the last 4 digit LS number in the state before the craziness of the class of ??99 five digit numbering? The ??broke the mold? surveyor?
Tick, tock, tick, tock. ....... Ding!
Question 2 ?? Who was the Oregon surveyor who was issued the last 4 digit LS number in the state before the craziness of the class of ??99 five digit numbering? The ??broke the mold? surveyor?
Tick, tock, tick, tock. ....... Ding!
The answer to question 2 answered question 2 correctly. Mark Mayer was issued the last 4 digit PLS number in Oregon.
Fun Fact. My mentor was licensed in 1977. I was licensed in 2018.
There were 19458 people licensed between us. I was the 19459th. If I was 19458, it would have worked out to sharing the same numbers, but obviously in a different order.
Question 1 ?? what the hell happened in 1977/1978 to make such a jump in licensees?
I know this one, too.?ÿ Let's just say that it was something that had to be done at the time,?ÿ and, with perhaps but a few exceptions,?ÿ that the average quality of surveys in Oregon goes up every time one of these guys hangs up his slide rule.?ÿ ?ÿ But I'll let you all guess at it awhile.
The Oregon Board is currently short one member, and that member needs to be a PLS.?ÿ Nominations?
The Oregon Board is currently short one member, and that member needs to be a PLS.?ÿ Nominations?
That last 4 digit PLS??
That might make a good fun fact on the application to be a board member...
The Oregon Board is currently short one member, and that member needs to be a PLS.?ÿ Nominations?
That last 4 digit PLS??
That might make a good fun fact on the application to be a board member...
What a thankless job. I don't think that it's even a paid position. And I'm not female, not a minority, not handicapped, and not a politically active Democrat. No chance.
Question 1 ?? what the hell happened in 1977/1978 to make such a jump in licensees?
Time's up.
Prior to that time PE's could do boundary surveys. Legally, that is. Not well.?ÿ The price of getting the law changed was grandfathering every PE who wanted one a PLS license.?ÿ
?ÿ
Like Mark said above and alluded to in a previous post, a lot of grandfathered PEs did some bad work.?ÿUnless you're familiar with his work,?ÿa big red flag goes up when you run across a PLS stamp that is issued 1977 or 1978. Some of them were doing fine survey work for a long time using their PE stamps, but many of the grandfathered PEs got their PLS stamps on a lark (surveying is easy, I took a class in college), shat out some bad mylars into the public record, and then faded away.
Question 1 ?? what the hell happened in 1977/1978 to make such a jump in licensees?
Time's up.
Prior to that time PE's could do boundary surveys. Legally, that is. Not well.?ÿ The price of getting the law changed was grandfathering every PE who wanted one a PLS license.?ÿ
?ÿ
So all a PE had to do was put in an application with NO qualifications other than already having an engineers license, and the Board would give them an LS number??ÿ
Thank you, and Mike, for the posts of surveying in Oregon history. Good to know this stuff.?ÿ
I would assume the jump in 1977-1978 was due to an upcoming change in licensing requirements. PEs can no longer be grandfathered in? Comity or licensing rules were about to be tightened?
YOU!?ÿ ??ÿ
So all a PE had to do was put in an application with NO qualifications other than already having an engineers license, and the Board would give them an LS number??ÿ
Prior to that time PEs could legally do boundary surveys. They were "qualified" land surveyors already.?ÿ ?ÿ
I was in the first class with the 5 digit numbers in Oregon. Licensed January 12, 1999 as 51523LS. The first few times I submitted a survey to a county surveyor's office I received a phone call asking me to put the correct license number on my stamp. Apparently nobody but OSBEELS knew those numbers had changed. That first group receiving their licenses in early 1999 with 5 digits numbered 12 people according to the list you recently sent to the county surveyor's offices. Although I remember the room containing about 30 -35 people.
W. C. Galloway was the Benton County Surveyor from November 1912 until his death October 12, 1949. He was also the County Engineer for a good portion of that time. As the person in charge of the Benton County PLSS corner restoration program, I follow a lot of Galloway's survey work, and he had a good reputation for a reason. His work was first rate, top notch.
?ÿApparently nobody but OSBEELS knew those numbers had changed. That first group receiving their licenses in early 1999 with 5 digits numbered 12 people according to the list you recently sent to the county surveyor's offices. Although I remember the room containing about 30 -35 people.
David - The list doesn't sort well once you get to the five digit numbers - I resorted it by date and 35 PLS licenses were issued between January and July of 1999. You come from an esteemed class - I know 5 of those guys and they are top notch dudes and do excellent work.
I went to the Benton CS web site when I did the original post because I thought they used to have biographies of former County Surveyors but apparently I was mistaken. A guy who worked for David Evans and Associates said they used to have two work boats, "The Preston" (after John Preston, first surveyor general of Oregon) and "The Galloway" after PLS #1. The little bit I could readily find about him was from the summer 2014 Oregon Examiner:?ÿ https://s3.amazonaws.com/online.pubhtml5.com/fplp/cmrf/index.html
