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Description:
All the original Mason and Dixon monuments were oolitic limestone, quarried and carved in Isle of Portland, England. Like all original milestones, 76 and 77 initially were 4.5 feet long, 12 inches square with a low pyramidal top. They were set to stand three feet above the ground. All four sides of the original milestones were embellished with vertical fluting and horizontally fluted 2-inch margins. The fluting carried up the top planes, rising about 2 inches to a center apex. A decorative Roman Capital letter P distinguished the north-facing side representing the Penn family’s Province of Pennsylvania and Roman Capital letter M for the south-facing side representing the Calvert family’s Province of Maryland. The letters were V-sunk and centered in a shallow recessed circle about 8 inches in diameter. Original milestones ranged in weight from 350-400 pounds. Milestones 76 and 77 were part of the third shipment of original milestones from England, which arrived in Baltimore in June, 1767. Stones from this shipment were used to mark miles 64 and 66 through 132 on the West Line in 1767. In 1900-03, during the resurvey of the Maryland-Pennsylvania boundary, surplus stones from this shipment were used t0 replace eleven damaged or missing stones on the West Line (23, 40, 43, 67, 75, 79, 99, 100, 115, 130, 132). This shipment also supplied an additional marker between 104 and 105. Stones from the shipment also replaced a select few of the rock mounds constructed by Mason and Dixon west of Sideling Hill (resurvey inventory numbers: 137, 138, 139, 140, 144). Milestone 76 along the West Line marks Mason and Dixon’s 76th horizontal mile west of the northeast corner of Maryland and the 79th horizontal mile west of Post Marked West. Mason and Dixon’s terminus point of the West Line, Brown’s Hill, is 154 horizontal miles west of Milestone 76. The entire length of the West Line is 230.228 miles. Standing within an agricultural field, Milestone 76 is in fair condition, at its original site surveyed on August 24, 1765 and set on October 13, 1767. It was reset to stand 1.5 feet above the ground in 1902. Today only one foot is exposed above ground. The top is rounded. Only the north side is visible with a faint P that has survived 250 years of exposure to the elements. The circle is quite worn. The south M side is encased by the base of a 30-foot elm tree, as are the remaining sides. The top 4 inches of the M side can be seen when standing against the elm tree. The top of the M is distinct. Milestone 77, marking Mason and Dixon’s 77th horizontal mile, and the 80th horizontal mile west of Post Marked West, is 153 miles east of Brown’s Hill. Milestone 77, also in an agricultural field, is in good condition at its original site surveyed on August 24, 1765 and set on October 14, 1767. Milestone 77 was reset in 1902 to stand 1.8 feet above ground and secured more firmly in place with a base equivalent to a cubic yard of solid masonry and concrete collar. Today it is slightly shorter with 1.6 feet exposed above ground. The pyramidal top is rounded down completely, as is the case with many of the original milestones. Seventy-seven has a fair amount of fluting visible on all 4 sides. Both letters, M and P, are distinct with the cut grooves in remarkable condition. Slight evidence of pock marks, caused by temperature changes and exposure to elements, are in various places on the top and sides of the stone. The circles are worn and hard to see but the indentation may be felt when you run your hand across the north and south sides. A shade tree protects the M side from afternoon sun. Photographs taken during the 1900-03 resurvey show that 77 had been leaning significantly to one side. Today 77 stands straight. Milestone 77 is set on the bank of Marsh Creek—on the West line but intentionally 125 yards east of its true location, which would have been within the creek itself. It is one of only two stones that Mason and Dixon purposely offset due to challenges associated with each stone’s true one-mile increment location and noted the exceptions in their Journal.
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Significance:
Mason and Dixon West Line Milestone Markers 76 and 77 are historically significant in the area of Engineering for their association with a major accomplishment in the history of surveying. They derive additional significance in the area of Politics/Government for their associated with the settlement of the Penn-Calvert Boundary Dispute, an 80-year land dispute between the Penn family’s Pennsylvania Province and the Calvert family’s Maryland province. A Maryland charter was granted to the Calverts in 1632 and a Pennsylvania Charter was granted to the Penns in 1681 by British kings. There were three main reasons for the ongoing dispute: ambiguous language used in the original grants putting a 69-mile strip of land in question, errors with John Smith’s 1608 map and disagreements with surveying of temporary lines. The most concerning discrepancy resulting from these issues located Philadelphia in both Maryland and Pennsylvania. On August 4, 1763, in London, England, Thomas and Richard Penn along with Lord Baltimore hired Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon to determine the boundaries between their Colonial Provinces of Maryland and Pennsylvania. All previous attempts to resolve the conflict had failed. Four survey lines were to be run and then marked, establishing English Law. Mason and Dixon were astronomers, mathematicians and surveyors highly regarded and recommended by Charles Bradley, the director of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich. Between 1764 and 1767, Mason and Dixon ran four astronomical lines: Arc Line, North Line, Tangent Line and West Line, and marked their lines at one-mile increments with quarried and cut stones imported from England and (in areas of difficult terrain in the western section of the West Line) by building mounds of rocks with center posts. Thus the question of land ownership was resolved, and the Penn-Calvert Boundary Dispute was settled. By early 1768, the Mason and Dixon line plan had been drawn, printed and distributed. Mason and Dixon’s line was ratified as the settled boundary between the two Provinces by the King of England on January 11, 1769. The cost of the survey, split by the Penns and Calverts, was approximately $75,000 at the time. For over 250 years the original Mason and Dixon West Line Milestone Markers have continued to mark the legal boundary between the present-day states of Maryland and Pennsylvania. The remaining original Mason and Dixon Milestone Markers on the Arc, North and Tangent Lines mark the legal boundary between the present-day states of Delaware and Maryland. Markers have been added to the Mason and Dixon line because of various re-surveys. These additional markers to the Mason and Dixon line now collectively define state lines between the four present-day states of Delaware, Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia. Milestone Markers 76 and 77 on the West Line are tangible links from the mid-18th century that have stood on this boundary line for 250 years dividing Provinces in Colonial America, demarcating States in Revolutionary America, and symbolizing the division between the industrial north and agricultural south leading up to the Civil War period.
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