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Introduction California
Pacific Northwest
By
Richard Soares
Science Librarian
CSU Chico
(The contents of this site also appears in the Western
Assoc. of Map Libraries Information Bulletin vol. 35 no. 2, March
2004)
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INTRODUCTION
Soil survey maps are an obvious source of
soil information for farmers, engineers, geologists, botanists, and
other scientists. Because they contain physiological features, cultural
features, and feature names, soil maps are a valuable alternative to
the early U.S. Geological Survey large scale topographic maps. Though
the U.S. Geological Survey began large scale mapping in 1884, many areas
remained unmapped until done so by one of the soil mapping bureaus of
the U.S.D.A. The genealogist, geographer, those researching property
boundary disputes or other historical issues, should consider the early
soil maps as another great source of information.
For more than 100 years
the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in cooperation with State
Agricultural Experiment Stations and other state agencies, has produced soil maps to
accompany soil survey reports. In 1899, the Division of Soils produced the first of the soil survey series and published it in 1900 as an annual titled “Reports of the Field Operations of the Division of Soils” under the
Superintendent of Documents call number (SuDoc) A26.5. Each of the
Reports of the Field Operations includes a volume of reports and a volume
of maps for areas throughout the United States. The
areas covered are typically though not consistently contiguous with county boundaries. Many individual
area reports were also issued as separates under SuDoc A26.5/a.
Since its
inception, responsibility for the soil
survey series changed multiple
times by name and/or changed physically to another U.S.D.A. bureau. The chart below shows these changes:
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History
of Changes in the U.S.D.A. Soil Survey Series
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Year of
change
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Description
of Change
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SuDoc Number
Change
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1899
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Division
of Soils produces 1st
in the Soil Survey series.
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A26.5: & A26.5/a:
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1901
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Changed name to Bureau
of Soils.
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Ibid
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1927
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Merged with the Bureau of Chemistry,
making the Bureau of Chemistry and Soils.
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A47.5: & A47.5/a:
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1928
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Title “Reports of the Field of Operations” dropped with publication of 1923 series.
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1938
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Soils unit transferred to the Bureau
of Plant Industry.
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A19.31: & A19.32:
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1942
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Changed name to Bureau
of Plant Industry, Soils, and Agricultural Engineering,
becoming part of the Agricultural Research Administration.
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A77.514:
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1952
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Soil survey program transferred to
the Soil Conservation Service.
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A57.38: [series date]/[map number]
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1967
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Post 1962 series given Cutter numbers
based on area or county name.
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A57.38: [Area/County Cutter number]
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1994
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Name changed to Natural
Resources Conservation Service.
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A57.38/[state number]: [Area/County
Cutter number]
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(Andriot, 1993; Baker, Rasmussen, Wiser, Porter, 1963; D. Helms
(personal communication, June 26, 2001))
As one can see from
the chart, the soil surveys have been through many changes. The changes
in provenance and subsequent SuDoc number changes are most
significant to depository libraries and soil survey users. Depositories
handled these changes in various ways, from simply labeling and filing
the new titles under the new SuDoc number, to pulling all soil surveys
from the SuDoc classification system and placing them into a consistent
Library of Congress classification. The former served as the common,
quick and easy response to the changes but resulted in the discontinuity
of the series in the stacks. This discontinuity and other factors, such as poor indexing & cataloging, can make them difficult to find, resultingin a hidden and unused collection of valuable "early" mapping.
Though several good indexes to soil maps
exist, i.e. List of Printed Soil Surveys by State http://soils.usda.gov/survey/printed_surveys/
and Aridic Soils of the United States and Israel
http://ag.arizona.edu/OALS/IALC/soils/surveys/bytext.html,
they give more information on the report rather than on the map, and
exclude some of the published titles. Same is true for library catalogs such as WorldCat,
the OCLC union catalog, and Melvyl, the University of California's union catalog. It is hoped that these bibliographies with the
indexes provide the necessary information to help find soil survey maps in
any depository library.
Map and report data was collected from personal inspection and evaluation of each sheet as well as various other sources. Those sources included WorldCat, Melvyl, and the Monthly Catalogue of United States Public Documents.
REFERENCES
Andriot,
D. (Ed.). (1993). Guide to U.S.
Government Publications. McLean, VA:
Documents Index.
Baker,
G. L., Rasmussen, W. D., Wiser, V., & Porter, J. M. (1963). Century of service: the first 100 years of the United States Department of Agriculture.
Washington:
Centennial Committee, U.S.D.A.
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