Louisiana Purchase was in 1803, this you already knew.<\/p>\n
Friday, November 11, 2022, you knew this about the Louisiana Purchase – but did you know about the initial point from which ALL surveys of property acquired through the Louisiana Purchase originated.<\/p>\n
This is where it all started the Louisiana Purchase, where for $15 million dollars or less than 3 cents an acre, in 1803, roughly doubled the size of the United States, but the purchase needed to be surveyed before the land could be sold. It wasn’t until 1815 when President James Madison needed the survey, so he could award the veterans of the war of 1812 the land they had been promised.<\/p>\n
I’m not sure I understand this, but this is where that survey began where a north south line at the Fifth Principle Meridian & Baseline intersected. \u00a0Not exactly sure where baseline came from. All surveys\u00a0west of this point started here.<\/p>\n
Here is a copy and paste from here –\u00a0https:\/\/encyclopediaofarkansas.net\/entries\/louisiana-purchase-survey-2204\/<\/p>\n
“The official land survey of the Louisiana Purchase began in October 1815, when two land surveyors, Prospect Robbins and Joseph Brown, set out on their journey from the Mississippi River. (Brown later became Surveyor General of Missouri for a brief period and surveyed the boundary between Arkansas and Missouri. Little is known about the surveyors except that they lived near Clayton, Missouri, outside present-day St. Louis.) Robbins began at the mouth of the Arkansas River<\/a> and surveyed due north. Brown began several miles upstream at the mouth of the St.\u00a0Francis River and proceeded due west. Brown\u2019s survey line is called the baseline, and Robbins\u2019s line is called the Fifth Principal Meridian because it was the fifth north-south line surveyed in the U.S.<\/p>\n During this time period, surveying land was exceptionally difficult work. Using only a compass and a chain, surveyors made their way through the wilderness, stopping every half mile to mark or \u201cblaze\u201d a tree. They carried all of their provisions with them for a task that lasted several months. In the vast wilderness of the Arkansas Delta where Robbins and Brown worked, the only signs of life were scattered Indian and animal trails.”<\/p>\n The park is about 38 acres total at the end of a dead end road and the parking lot is kinda small. We were prepared to unhook the jeep to get turned around but it was JUST big enough, since there were no one else there.<\/p>\n Because we had fair cell service and a short distance to go we sat there a couple of hours after walking the boardwalk to the marker site.<\/p>\n Can you see the straight line in the trees, that’s due west by the way.<\/p>\n\n\t\t