This photograph shows Pete Zapadka, a member of the Amateur Astronomers Association of Pittsburgh (AAAP), leaning on the Cornerstone Monument at the precise geographic location of the southwest corner of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania--the official end of the Mason-Dixon Line. Although due to Native American territory disputes, astronomers Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon never saw this site; their portion of the Mason-Dixon Line Survey ended prematurely 23 miles short of this site, 250 years ago today (October 18). Philadelphia clock-maker and astronomer David Rittenhouse placed this monument and completed the Mason-Dixon Line Survey in 1784.
(Image Source: Amateur Astronomer Pete Zapadka)
By Glenn A. Walsh
Reporting for SpaceWatchtower
On this date 250 years ago (1767
October 18), astronomers Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon completed surveying
most of the southern boundary of Pennsylvania [separating from the
colonies of Maryland and Virginia (now the state of West Virginia)],
what became the most famous boundary in U.S. history: the Mason-Dixon
Line. Although contracted to survey to, what is now, the southwest
corner of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, local Native Americans
prevented the survey of the last 23 miles of the boundary line.
Philadelphia clock-maker and astronomer David Rittenhouse headed a
survey team which finished surveying those last 23 miles in 1784.
The whole idea behind the Mason-Dixon
Line began with a colonial land dispute between two influential
British families. In 1632, English King Charles I gave a grant of
land, in the American Colonies, to Cecilius Calvert. The grant for
what would become the colony of Maryland provided land north of
Virginia and south of the 40th parallel. Today, the City
of Pittsburgh is located at the 40th parallel, so this
land grant included much of what is now southern Pennsylvania.
In 1681, King Charles II provided a
second land grant to William Penn for what would become the Province
of Pennsylvania. Although it did mention that the southern boundary
of this land grant would be the 40th parallel, much of the
rest of the delineation of the land grant was convoluted and
confusing. Hence, the Penn Family interpreted the grant to include
land north of the 39th parallel.
.
The Penn and Calvert families both
claimed the land between the 39th and 40th
parallels. And, since the thriving City of Philadelphia was within
these two latitudes, this made the dispute even more contentious.
However, such land disputes were common in the 17th and
18th centuries, as there had been little actual surveying
in America and maps and land grants were often quite vague.
The Penn and Calvert families tried to
convince the settlers of the disputed region that they lived in
Pennsylvania or Maryland, respectively—and, they should pay taxes
to the appropriate colony. Most colonists did not care which colony
they lived in; but, they did not want to pay taxes to both colonies!
After several decades, the dispute
actually led to war between Pennsylvania and Maryland! What became
known as Cresap's War (named for Thomas Cresap, a Maryland partisan
who had moved into, what is now York County, Pennsylvania, part of
the disputed territory) was a series of skirmishes between the two
colonies. Also known as the Conojocular War, militias from both
Maryland and Pennsylvania fought for about a year or so, until King
George II enacted a cease-fire in 1738.
In 1750, King George II created a
formal truce between the two colonies. This truce granted most of the
disputed territory to Pennsylvania. However, no one knew where the
actual boundary line between the two colonies was located. So, in
1763 the Penn and Calvert families agreed to pay for a boundary
survey. Well known English astronomers and surveyors Charles Mason
and Jeremiah Dixon were hired to conduct this survey.
Charles Mason had been employed by the
Royal Society in Greenwich, England to observe the stars and the
Moon, and create lunar tables that could be used to determine
longitude. Jeremiah Dixon was a surveyor, trained by a renowned maker
of high-precision astronomical instruments, John Bird.
Mason and Dixon traveled through the
wilderness of early Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, and Virginia,
using the stars to create the boundary line, now known as the
Mason-Dixon Line. The boundary began 15 miles south of the
southern-most tip of the City of Philadelphia.
The east-west, 233-mile line formed the
southern boundary of Pennsylvania with Maryland, and for the area
west of the beginning of the Potomac River, Virginia. Of course,
during the American Civil War this section of Virginia seceded from
the Commonwealth of Virginia and became the state of West Virginia.
They also surveyed the 83-mile western
boundary of Delaware [then considered the 3 “Lower Counties on the
Delaware” (New Castle, Kent, and Sussex) of the Province of Pennsylvania], separating, what would
become, the second smallest state of the Union from Maryland.
At one-mile intervals, Mason and Dixon
laid mile-marker stones all along the surveyed route. On the north
side of the marker was chiseled the letter P for Pennsylvania; on the
south side of the marker is the letter M for Maryland. As a five-mile
marker, the stone included the Penn Family Coat of Arms on the north
side of the stone and the Calvert Family Coat of Arms on the south
side of the stone.
Each stone was a huge block of
limestone, 3.5 to 5 feet long, weighing 300 to 600 pounds. These
stones had come from a quarry in southern England. Mason and Dixon
carried these stones with them, during the survey, using a horse and
wagon.
Many of these stones survive. However,
some are missing. For instance, one stone was hit by a snow-plow in
January of 1996, and it was pushed down into a farmer's field. After
more than 200 years, this particular stone now sits in a farmer's
barn.
As the surveyors entered the Allegheny
Mountains, they did not always lay stones at one-mile intervals.
Instead, they created groupings of rocks or cairns as mile-markers.
Even in the 18th century,
surveying was not a new science. However, it was quite an achievement
to survey a new boundary line in rugged terrain, often harsh weather,
and with the constant risk of attack from Native Americans.
It usually took a couple of weeks, at
least, for each set of astronomical observations for a particular
mile-marker. They would spend clear-sky nights (of course, they could
not work during cloudy nights) taking observations of stars,
sometimes in very cold weather. They would have to lie on their backs
and look through a 6-foot long telescope, measuring angles between
stars and a north-south meridian line.
However, they did use state-of-the-art
equipment. Jeremiah Dixon's mentor, John Bird, developed the Zenith
Sector they used, which was the most advanced instrument of its day
for determining latitude. According to John Bird, it was accurate to
within 100 feet.
Scientists and geographers remember the
work of Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon for two particular
contributions to scientific literature:
- They measured the first degree of latitude in the Americas;
- They made the first scientific gravity measurements in the Americas.
The Pennsylvania land grant had
extended 5 degrees of longitude west of the Delaware River, to the location of
the southwest corner of Pennsylvania. Mason and Dixon had been
commissioned to survey to the southwest corner of Pennsylvania.
However, they never made it that far.
The Native American guides of Mason and
Dixon refused to guide them into the territory of their enemy, the
Shawnee and Delaware tribes. So, on Sunday, 1767 October 18, Mason and Dixon
made their final observations before turning-back to return to
Philadelphia, 23 miles short of their goal.
The following entry from Mason and Dixon's Journal, written by Charles Mason, describes setting the final mile-marker of their survey:
“Note: The Sector stood on the top of a very lofty Ridge, but when the Offset was made of 3 Chains 38 Links it fell a little Eastward of the top of the Hills; we therefore extended the true Parallel 3 Chains 80 Links Westward which fell on the top of the said Ridge; there viz. at 233 Miles 17 Chains 48 Links from the Post marked West in Mr. Bryan's Field, we set up a Post marked Won the West Side and heaped around it Earth and Stone three yards and a half diameter at the Bottom and five feet High. The figure nearly conical.”
After setting the last mile-stone, Mason and Dixon remained at the site until Tuesday, 1767 October 20, when their journal reported:
“Began to open a Visto in the True Parallel Eastward.”
Philadelphia clock-maker and
astronomer, David Rittenhouse (along with surveyor Andrew Ellicott)
completed surveying these last 23 miles in 1784. In addition to his
scientific pursuits, University of Pennsylvania Astronomy Professor
David Rittenhouse served as Treasurer of Pennsylvania from 1779 to
1787, and on behalf of the Federal Government he founded the U.S.
Mint in 1792.
Although Mason and Dixon never reached
the southwest corner of Pennsylvania, this was their contracted goal.
Hence, the entire boundary line to the southwest corner of
Pennsylvania is considered the Mason-Dixon Line. Although the
Mason-Dixon Line does not follow an exact line of latitude, it is
geographically located at approximately 39 degrees and 43 minutes
North Latitude.
Beyond the end of the Mason-Dixon Line,
at the southwest corner of Pennsylvania, the line continues west to
the Ohio River, forming the boundary line between Marshall and Wetzel
Counties in West Virginia. However, this county boundary line was
formed by the Virginia Assembly in the latter part of the 18th
century and is not an official part of the Mason-Dixon Line.
In 1786, Andrew Ellicott was
commissioned to survey the western boundary line of Pennsylvania
(which came to be known as Ellicott's Line), from the end of the
Mason-Dixon Line, north, to Lake Erie. Part of this boundary was
between Pennsylvania and Virginia; the area of Virginia between
Pennsylvania and the Ohio River now contains four counties (Hancock, Brooke, Ohio, and Marshall) in what is
now the Northern Panhandle of West Virginia.
North of the location where the Ohio
River leaves Pennsylvania, this boundary line codified the boundary
between Pennsylvania and the Federal Territory known as the “Ohio
Country,” part of the Northwest Territory. This boundary line was
important because Pittsburgh and a small part of Western Pennsylvania
had originally been considered part of the Ohio Country (an area that
had been roughly defined as west of the Allegheny Mountains, north of
the Ohio River, and south of Lake Erie). The vast majority of the
Ohio Country was admitted to the Union as the State of Ohio on 1803
March 1.
The Mason-Dixon Line has come to be
known as the dividing line between the northern United States and the
southern United States. This division began as early as 1790 March 1,
when the Pennsylvania General Assembly passed legislation banning
slavery in the Commonwealth. As Maryland still allowed slavery (as
did Delaware and Virginia), by 1804 the Mason-Dixon Line came to be
seen as the dividing line between the slave states (in the South) and
free states (in the North).
During the first half of the 19th
century, the Mason-Dixon Line came to be known, by slaves fleeing
their southern masters, as the line of freedom. The Underground
Railroad consisted of abolitionists at secret way-stations who would
help African-Americans from the South cross the Mason-Dixon Line on
their way to freedom and a new life.
A spiritual song sung by these run-away
slaves, “Follow the Drinking Gourd,” helped these mostly
illiterate refugees find their way north. The song reminded them to
search for the Big Dipper asterism in the night sky, which would help
them find the North Star, Polaris.
The Mason-Dixon Line was mentioned
during Congressional debates leading to the Missouri Compromise of
1820, which allowed Missouri to enter the Union as a slave state,
while Maine entered the Union as a free-soil state. At that time,
politicians considered the Mason-Dixon Line, and extending further
west along the Ohio River, as the boundary line between slave and
free-soil states. The Missouri Compromise legally forbade the
admission of states, which had been part of the Louisiana Purchase
territories, as slave states if they existed north of Latitude 36
degrees, 30 minutes North (the southern boundary of Missouri);
however, the legislation also allowed one exception: Missouri.
When the American Civil War, or War
Between the States, erupted in 1861, the Mason-Dixon Line was still
considered a dividing line between North and South. But because
Washington, DC, a southern city, had been chosen as the site of the
new nation's capital (due to the Compromise of 1790, which allowed
the Federal Government to pay-off Revolutionary War debts of the
states, in return for locating the national capital in the South),
the Federal Government refused to allow Maryland to join the
Confederate States of America (CSA), even though Maryland (along with
pro-Union border states Delaware, Kentucky, and Missouri) continued
to allow slavery.
In the middle of the Civil War, 50
counties in western Virginia broke-away from Virginia (which included
the state capital, Richmond, as the capital of the Confederacy) to form a new state, West
Virginia, which was admitted to the Union on 1863 June 20. On that
date, no longer did any portion of the Mason-Dixon Line touch the
Commonwealth of Virginia; the section of the Mason-Dixon Line
previously bordering Virginia now bordered West Virginia.
Derived from the title, Mason-Dixon
Line, and the surname of Jeremiah Dixon, “Dixie” became a name
generally identifying the southern United States in the early 19th
century. During the Civil War, it was generally used to refer to the
Confederacy.
The song, “Dixie” or “I Wish I
Was in Dixie,” probably reinforced the popular notion that Dixie
meant the American South. The song became the unofficial anthem of
the Confederacy during the Civil War, after being played during the
inauguration of Confederate President Jefferson Davis in 1861. Upon
hearing of the Confederate General Robert E. Lee's surrender at
Appomattox County, Virginia in 1865, U.S. President Abraham Lincoln asked the
military band to play “Dixie.”
There is still some dispute regarding
who wrote the song, although it seems the song may have been
authored by Daniel Emmett, a Northerner from Mount Vernon, Ohio in
1859. It quickly became popular through black-face minstrel shows.
Today, the song “Dixie” is still
popular in the South. And, the term Dixie is still used to represent
the South. In fact, a popular grocery store chain in the South, known
as Winn-Dixie (headquartered in Jacksonville), operates 495 stores in five
southern states (Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, and
Mississippi).
Interestingly, a handsome, 10-story office building in a northern city is called Dixie Terminal. Built in Downtown Cincinnati in 1921, this building is located only dozens of feet from the Ohio River. It was named Dixie Terminal because it was once a streetcar terminal (later commuter bus terminal) for streetcars coming from Dixie--that is, the suburbs of Northern Kentucky.
Interestingly, a handsome, 10-story office building in a northern city is called Dixie Terminal. Built in Downtown Cincinnati in 1921, this building is located only dozens of feet from the Ohio River. It was named Dixie Terminal because it was once a streetcar terminal (later commuter bus terminal) for streetcars coming from Dixie--that is, the suburbs of Northern Kentucky.
Internet Links to Additional Information ---
Photograph of Historical Marker near end of Survey conducted by Mason and Dixon:
Link >>> http://spacewatchtower.blogspot.com/2017/10/astronomical-calendar-2017-october.html
Mason-Dixon Line Survey web-site ExploretheLine, with photos of survey markers:
Link >>> http://www.exploretheline.com/index1.html
Charles Mason: Link >>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Mason
Jeremiah Dixon: Link >>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremiah_Dixon
David Rittenhouse: Link >>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Rittenhouse
University of Pennsylvania Astronomy Professor David Rittenhouse inspires the field of stars on
the American Flag: Link >>> http://spacewatchtower.blogspot.com/2017/06/240th-anniversary-of-american-flag-why.html
Andrew Ellicott: Link >>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Ellicott
Special Thanks: Amateur Astronomer Pete Zapadka.
Source: Glenn A. Walsh Reporting for SpaceWatchtower, a project of Friends of the Zeiss.
2017 October 18.
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