• KentIslandBaseLine

Kent Island Base Line (1842-1844)

The Kent Island base line was originally measured when triangulation was brought from Fire Island in New York to the Chesapeake Bay and the District of Columbia. It was also used as a basis for the measurement of Chesapeake Bay, and when the Transcontinental Triangulation project was initiated in 1871, the Kent Island base line was already situated near the 39th parallel and was incorporated into the network.

The measurement was supervised by James Ferguson, Assistant of the Coast Survey, and occured between May 3 and June 5, 1844, and was performed by means of iron bars supported by 8-meter boxes. The line was measured just once, and required 1,086 repositionings. The line length was computed to be 8,687.5446 meters, +/- 6.80 cm, reduced to sea level.

By 1888, the southern shore of the island had been washed out and the southern base line station monument was lost.

See also: transcontinental triangulation, Eastern Shore series, Allegheny series