COAST AND GEODETIC SURVEY

UNITED STATES, a service of the Federal government devoted to surveying and charting the coasts of the United States and its outlying po e ions. ‘The surveying of coasts and adjoining waters is a task which every maritime nation has a umed for at least two centuries past, primarily for the purpose of facilitating and rendering le dangerous its shipping. The importance of this service to the United States may be judged by the fact that the general coast line of the country itself is over 10,000 miles in length, and that of the colonial po e ions even greater. It was President Thomas Jefferson who gave the first impulse to the establishment of such a service by recommending it to Congre , in 1807. It was then placed under the charge of the Secretary of the Treasury, the actual work of surveying and making soundings and the preparation of charts being done by naval and military officers. Since 1898 all the work has devolved on a special service, the officers of which are experienced hydrographic engineers. The actual field work consists largely in taking soundjngs of the waters along the coast and surveying the land along the waterline within a strip from three to five miles wide. With this material the office in Washington prepares general charts, harbor charts, tide tables, current tables and special publications giving instructions to navigators and _ pilots. In July, 1922, the service reported that the complete survey of the two continental coasts had been about half accomplished, that of the Philippines was nearly completed, the work along the Alaska coast was about one-third done, and that about three years work was still needed in Hawaii, Porto Rico and the Virgin Islands.