Alameda County-George A. Posey (1920s)

[Dave Karoly, PLS]

I'm not sure if he was the County Surveyor but his field books are at the CS office.

He surveyed Lot 17, Block 2 of Hayward Home Farm Tract, 28 Maps 80. There is a map by him which subdivides Lot 17 into 3 lots which was never conveyed that way as far as I know. I also have a copy of the field notes by his crew of Tooky?, Rice (head chain) & Burgess (hard to read, very small handwriting). A strong wind was blowing on May 22, 1926.

I have found 3-1 inch diameter, open, galvanized iron pipes. These are at the southwest corner, northwest corner and northeast corner (on the R/W). I found a spike with Davis, LS3352, washer at the southeast corner (on the R/W). I am surveying roughly the south half of Lot 16. I found no evidence of a pipe near the spike which is on the high side of a 1 foot high brick retaining wall.

The two pipes on the north line of 17 and the Davis spike fit the Posey map geometry fairly well (on the 2 tenth level). There is some systematic shift (maybe a quarter foot) and maybe a twist from the City's perpetuation of the centerline control. The fit of the pipe at the southwest corner of Lot 17 is a little rougher, about 6 tenths.

I also found a rebar with tag, LS3814, on the R/W which is where I would set the Deed cut line which split Lot 16 in half.

I plan to go back to the CS research room again to make sure I haven't missed anything.

Is anyone familiar with Posey's work? What did he set or not set?

[Ric7308]

bogus theory

[Dave Karoly, PLS]

Posey was CS from 1921 to 1932.

I'm pretty sure Posey didn't set the pipes I found out there.

I have a copy of Posey's 1926 field notes. There are red marked edits dated in 1934. They increase the distance on one line on Highland Boulevard by 1' from 710.70' to 711.70' and prorate a corner in on the centerline. The pipes fit Posey's 1926 survey except for one which hits the 1934 proration within 0.03' which is pretty good considering the 1912 to 1926 centerline control has been replaced with monument wells and manhole rim marks. At this point I think the pipes were set by the CS in 1934 or a surveyor later using the 1926 survey as corrected in 1934 (the notes are quasi-public record).

Considering more analysis of the evidence...the pipe at the northwest corner of 17 fits very close to Posey's map, the pipe at the southwest corner of 17 fits the location calcd from the 1934 edits (accounting for the 0.6' error I thought it had based on Posey alone), the Davis spike at the southeast corner on the R/W fits very close to the Posey location. The pipe on the northeast of 17 at the R/W is tha apparent outlier, the others fit well with the block control as perpetuated by the City.

There is a history of unrecorded surveys in the neighborhood. Harold Bakken did an R/S that has a detailed history of surveying in the area.