California Surveyors Forums

Interesting find and fascinating history.

The PDF tells the story.

Next time you find some tag or lead 0.04' off or a tenth or two tenths off and you are working with City of Los Angeles notes...check the field notes, therein probably lies the answer why the monument you found is out of place.

As far as the SSM goes (Standard Survey Well Monument) the norm is to place a more suitable monument where the 2" x 2" was placed. This was not done. My gut feeling is that the guys setting the SSM saw the pipe and just did not place a punched dural bar in a PCC foundation. Smart crew!

Edit: The PDF of my RS must have gotten lost during board maintenance so I have re-attached it. Without the PDF none of my post will make any sense.

LOL I had the same experience in Signal Hill. Ignored their own ties and used a mon in the next block (farm lot) and their gear spk and wshr at their int was off ~3 tenths.

Many years ago I was somewhere in the Carson/Wilmington area and found a LARD tag and LA engr tag less than 2 tenths apart at a cl int. It was at least 1/4 mile to the next int any direction.

Wow! A surveyor that understands "pedigree"!!!! Great job, Paul!

(The same can be said of Records of Surveys - not all are vetted like you did with the monument.)

Exemplary. Best to all for 2014!

Respectfully, Phil - Sonoma

I have attached the circa 1930 field book page in PDF format. This page shows the initial discovery of the pipe by the City of LA crew and how they tied it out. It also shows when the pipe was rejected by the 1964 crew retracing that particular 1930 page.

Tract No. 1000 was a very big subdivision. I did not count the lots subdivided by the tract, but it is well over 1000. Many of the lots were 1/4 x 1/8 mile divisions. A large number of the lots exceeded 100+ acres. It is the main subdivision that created the San Fernando Valley area from a Rancho Grant.

Though the pipe was never called on the record map (Tr. N0 1000) to be set, who else but the original surveyor would have set it? It was nothing but raw land and maybe some orange trees for miles.

Tract No. 9418 that first discovered this pipe was also the first subdivision in that area that was tied to the common corner of Lots 258 and 261 which the pipe marks..

Did the 1964 surveyors write on the 1930 field notes? That made a mess, hard to decipher.

Dave Karoly, PLS wrote:Did the 1964 surveyors write on the 1930 field notes? That made a mess, hard to decipher.

Yes he did. Was standard practice to do that. Each change or notation was dated and at times initialed.

The two handwriting styles are the way to differentiate what was a 1930 note and a 1964 note.

The detail of the 2x2 and tack to the pipe was made by 'W.E.S.', the letter 'S' is the clue the 1964 surveyor made the detail.

What stumps me still are the notations 'bad order 3/64' on two of the 2x2 tan ties.

This particular page was edited in 3/64 and also 12/18/64. The Dec 64 editing was done by a chief named 'Sieler' who I presume to be the W.E.S. that rejected the pipe. Very possibly because it conflicted with his math of measured and grid as noted on the left side of the page with a Dec 64 date