#surveyors

Legendary land surveyor Frank Swannell pulls his boat through shallow waters in the Kootenay River.

British Columbia

Minneapolis Lot Surveys Mapped

Recently, Special Collections partnered with the Hennepin County Surveyor's Office to add historic Minneapolis lot surveys to the county's Interactive Property Map. When zoomed in, the surveyed properties map layer outlines properties for which a historic lot survey is available and links out to the survey in the library's Digital Collections.

Lot surveys are drawings conducted by surveyors establishing the property lines for a specific property. Typically done at the time the house or building was first constructed, lot surveys were also sometimes conducted for permit projects where the location of property lines was significant, such as when adding a garage or retaining wall. The lot survey collection includes surveys for Minneapolis properties with building permit (B permit) work performed from 1916 to 1965. Lot surveys do not exist for every building permit. 

Surveyor’s Manuscripts in Special Collections

I basically just wandered into the vault to find something interesting, and the vault always come through! What I ended up looking at is this group of surveyor’s maps of townships in Ohio from 1799-1805. A large portion of the maps and data refers to the Beaver Creek area, just north of Oberlin, running through South Amherst, Amherst, and up to the lake. A very cool, if pretty beat up find. 

From what I can tell surveying was not always an outlet for creativity, though at least one of the four surveyors added some color to his maps. Lots of math also appears to be involved... 

19th century surveyor’s transit