FINALLY found old map of my town after much research...need a bit of help though

[HollandsBrook]

Hello all. I live near an old village that was est. in 1711 in central jersey. as a kid, i spent countless hours in the creek/woods near this village fishing, building forts, etc. One day i stumbled upon an old well about 10 yards away from the woods-line, near an old road leading up to this village. the well is halfway between the road and the creek and was always mysterious to me as there are no old houses in the immediate area. I decided to detect this area a few months ago and dug a Rev. War period french colonial navy button a few feet from the well. (ive posted this find in this forum in the past). i also dug an old horseshoes, oyster shells, nails, and odd metal pieces that i concluded to be wagon parts. a few members of this forum and others suggested there might have been some sort of dwelling near this well as part of the village down the road. perhaps a temporary, one room dwelling for those building a house down the road. after 2 months of looking through old maps of the area for a marking in this spot, i've finally found something very interesting. i cropped the map and made some markings of my own in photoshop for easier understanding. a few questions of the top of my head based on this illustration are:

1. would a cartographer in 1903 make a marking as pointed out in this picture for anything other than a house or building? i.e, shed, barn, etc.
2. the marking here is on the east side of the creek (much lower than the west side where the well is). Would it make sense to build on the low side of a creek for fear of flooding?
3. why would a house and the house's well be on opposite sides of a creek? especially with the well on high side.

I dont believe that this would have been a temporary house for the village down the road because it is depicted on a map in 1903. By then the villagers would have torn down this temporary dwelling and used the materials for the new house. I am extremely familiar with this wooded area in question, and have never come across any cellar holes. if you notice there is another small dot across from the one in question here that is also not in existence today.

any help, answers to my questions, or thoughts would be much appreciated. thanks for reading!

 

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[DCMatt]

My experience with these old USGS topo maps is that they are pretty good with locations of houses, although they could be off by as much as a few hundred yards.

I looked up your area on a more modern topo map (1981) and it shows the "dot" on the west side of the road in the same general location. http://terraserver-usa.com

Can't answer the question about whether it make sense to build on the low side or have the well across the creek... Are you sure it's a well?

DCMatt

 

[HollandsBrook]

Re: FINALLY found old map of my town after much research...need a bit of help th

thanks for the response. no i have not been to the clerks office. i am quite certain that the land is township property at present. ill definitely look into your suggestion. thanks!

 

[PBK]

Re: FINALLY found old map of my town after much research...need a bit of help th

You might also want to try Sanborn maps:

http://sanborn.umi.com/

 

[HollandsBrook]

Re: FINALLY found old map of my town after much research...need a bit of help th

this may be a silly question but would something like that cost anything? are clerk offices set up like a library where you do your own research?

 

[chipveres]

I think I see another "house dot" on the west side of the creek by the heavy contour line. Perhaps the well was for this house?

Chip V.

 

[BuckleBoy]

Topo maps are o.k., but what you really need is an older one. Structures that are long gone will not be on the map you posted. And abandoned buildings may show on your topo as a hollow dot--but barns and other unoccupied structures are frequently listed the same way. Try to find an old Atlas of your whole state (and then look at your specific township and town). Most of these are 1870's or 80's...but in some cases you can find maps that are even older that show structures. And if you can find several older maps, you can then start to compare the locations of dots on all of them for more accuracy. Any cartographer can make a mistake--and to a certain extent, we're at their mercy...we spend a whole day on a wild goose chase if they put the dot in the wrong place.


-Buckles

 

[PBK]

Re: FINALLY found old map of my town after much research...need a bit of help th

Here's a links page you might like, with quite a few older maps of New Jersey:

http://mapmaker.rutgers.edu/MAPS.html

 

[greengorilla]

Right on the creek, I would suspect it to be a gristmill or water pumping house. Other old topo's show mills that way.

 

[Monty]

It wasn't unusual for there to be a "community well" that served several houses. Perhaps the well in question was same? Monty

 

[mrs.oroblanco]

Re: FINALLY found old map of my town after much research...need a bit of help th

Not sure about your area, but, in the Pennsylvania are that I am from, there are many wells across the creeks from the homes.

The reasons are several.

One of our houses had one.

It was formerly a farm, they used the creek to hand drill/dig a well (it was about 20 feet deep, I think) with a line running towards the house, and another running to the fields, and the creek fenced off so that the cattle could not contaminate the water.

It gravity fed in one direction (slight hill), the other side was pumped. They had a foot-bridge to go across the creek. They also had a top over the well. (springhouse)

B

 

[HollandsBrook]

Re: FINALLY found old map of my town after much research...need a bit of help th

thanks for all your input! i went back down to the well to hunt for the dot on the map, and sure enough it was there!!!!! the only thing is that it was on the opposite side of the creek that the map said it would be and directly in front of the well (so basically the house was on the high side of the creek, in between in the road and the well. before i discovered it, i was detecting all around the well until i literally tripped on a pile of rocks. after a few minutes of pulling away thick weeds, i knew if was the foundation. the house must have been very small because the foundation perimeter was not large. it is made entirely of rock, not cinder block (does this mean that it dates older than early 1900's?) I was only able to detect for a half hour or so before a storm hit, so i did not find much. i attached a few pics of what i found below that i have no idea what they are. one item appears to be a ruler because of the markings that really cant be seen from this pic. its rather heavy and appears to be copper or bronze. it looks as though it is broken in half at the 6 inch mark. one picture not listed here are some sort of metal pipes that i dug under one of the walls that may have lead to the well. hopefully i can make it back down there in the next few days.

 

[HollandsBrook]

Re: FINALLY found old map of my town after much research...need a bit of help th

sry i meant brass not bronze*

 

[Montana Jim]

Wells were where the water was... not always where the house was... Looks like a great place to detect...