Using old maps with gps

[Obie]

My hubby and I are newbies to metal detecting and still trying to learn the various tones on our original Tesoro Golden uMAX. I know that a lot of people are using vintage maps to locate old homesites, etc. We recently moved from Charleston, SC to Eutawville, SC. When we first purchased our Tesoro Golden uMAX from a dealer in Charleston, we were told that we could use it on the beaches but it did nothing but pick up the minerals from saltwater . Could anyone please let us know how to use vintage maps of the area with gps and how to go about doing so ? Too, has anyone had any decent finds in this area (near Santee, Holly Hill and Eutawville Springs) ? Any help would be greatly appreciated. TIA and Happy Hunting !

 

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[A#1]

Finding old home sites is something I could describe my way of doing, but it's not a quick and simple type thing.

Do you have any old maps? Not just any old map, some are truly useless. New and old county or township plat maps, farm maps, forest maps, old topo maps....first you need the data. These maps often have homes, schools, ruins, things like that marked on them. Hit your local library, look for the archive, or rare book room. Visit on geneology night, that tends to bring out plat maps. Comb Ebay daily, go to township halls, historical societies, any type of local historical museum.....many of these places have old maps hanging on display. Don't forget your camera. Check out websites like historicaerials.com or historicmapworks.com Don't expect this part to be easy, I literally have hundreds of dollars invested over 30 years of searching for stuff like this....and only in a single county

Usually the old map can get you close enough to find a site just comparing it to the new maps. No GPS needed, and often the cartographer was dead nuts accurate with the location.

If you need to go further, you can take scans of your old maps and overlay them onto Google Earth. Align, and size them as needed, pin mark the location on the map, then export them using a file that you can import into your GPS Is your GPS handheld, cell phone, automotive?....like i said, not just something you can do easily.

If all else fails, do it the old fashioned way. Get a tank of gas and drive. Hit every back road for miles around. Look for things like Lilac bushes, or fruit trees, abnormal clumps of trees, foundations. This is probably the easiest.

I looked quickly on Google Earth, and it looks as if you're in farm country, there has to be a bunch the were abandoned during the depression. I checked the 4 surrounding 7.5 minute USGS topo maps, but they're from 1979 and show no ruins.

 

[Got-Good-Tones]

Following link to a map of Eutawville might help you out some...(Eutawville, 1932, Unpublished) do a Google search for a program called "Maprika". With this program you can make up your own geo-rectified maps...

Eutawville, 1932, Unpublished :: Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps

 

[Got-Good-Tones]

Forgot to add the following info in my previous post...once you get to that website...click on "search all maps" button...and just scroll down until you find the Eutawville map in the list of maps.

 

[roaddust66]

Historic Aerials ...click on the topo maps and go back in time to maps of the 1940's ....