I’m in North Louisiana and all of the older maps I can find can only get me into the 40’s / 50’s. Does anyone have any recommendations for any websites or archives that possess older maps. I metal detect whenever I get a chance, but I haven’t found a silver since 2022 and I’m ready to find some spots that haven’t been detected already.
In need of older aerials
- Thread starter Ttedeton
- Start date
stetam
Elite Member
That’s the oldest you will get. 40’s? Heck you’re lucky to get that
Tom_in_CA
Elite Member
- Joined
- Dec 23, 2013
- Messages
- 23,504
Ttedeton, your title says "aerials", yet your post text says "maps". So which is it ? If you meant "aerials", then yes, 1940s is typically the oldest you'll get . Wasn't too much aviation , prior to that, running around taking purposed pix of things from the air. A few random photos from the early days of barnstorming, but the typical earliest dates on here , are from the 1940s at the earliest : https://www.historicaerials.com/viewer
Tom_in_CA
Elite Member
- Joined
- Dec 23, 2013
- Messages
- 23,504
David Rumsey Historical Map Collection | The Collection
www.davidrumsey.com
markinmichigan
Forum Supporter
Thanks Tom
randy
Forum Supporter
We are lucky to have late 30s aerials in PA. But the difference doesn't much matter if you are looking for bulk silver. That was a period of minimal economic advancement and then the economy was dedicated to the war, so the development of the land wasn't much different over those 5-10 years.
You should be able to find turn of the century USGS maps online. They show where the buildings and roads were.
A better bet is LIDAR. A good LIDAR dataset will show roadbeds from the 1700s that you may not see in the field unless you already know where they are. These often do not show up on the 30s aerials. Once you get into it, you will be amazed with LIDAR, but there is a bit of a learning curve, and the datasets have to exist for the area of interest (if they do, they tend to be free online). I'm sure you can find a bzillion LIDAR tutorials online (I'm lucky that a friend of mine is a signal processing wiz (he wrote software that runs on Hubble and JWST) and I fell into LIDAR very early in its existence).
Also, where I live, we have a used bookstore which has 1700s maps for sale, but that is a lucky resource. Maybe you have one as well. Maybe you can find old map listings on EBAY. You never know.
As for finding a virgin site, good luck. You will have better luck finding a unicorn. Not to say it doesn't exist, but it is rare. I believe every piece of public property has been hunted by someone, even if there is no reason to. I know I just hunt random fields with no reason to. It happens, I found a site with 20+ coppers kind of randomly, and it is one of my life projects to figure out what was there (so far, no luck), but it is rare. Also found a 4 reale Spanish silver in a random field. But this approach takes alot of time and patience (fortunately, I have those things when other projects aren't in the way (like now)).
I did once find an old public football field which was always locked, but by chance they were doing a resodding, and the gates were open for construction equipment. I got not only the top layer but the next layer after they had stripped off the top 6 inches for a total of 142 silvers from the site. Likely a virgin site or close to it. But oddly, only half the field gave up anything. Clearly the other half had been hunted well; why they did not finish the job I will never know. Possibly something similar in the past where they had only the time to do one half of it.
But luck, not skilled research. You have plenty of competition doing the same research with the same resources. You need to find an edge. No one is going to give up their edge, if they have one. I know I'm not, assuming I have one.
So, it can come down to a good machine and technical skill with it. Make sure you at least have that. You would be astounded at the number of silvers I have pulled from "hunted out sites". But I think that is technique and equipment, not research.
Back to research, likely your best bet is permission sites. Some people are dead fish and that winnows the competition a bit, but you see a hot site on the aerials on private property, even if the owner gives you permission, he'll often say "I've had 10 guys thru here already". Again, you need to be better with the machine than those guys. I do not think I have ever found a high yield virgin site on private property. My largets are 63 and 43 silvers respectively, but it is hard to believe they were virgin; they were so bloody obvious just by driving by, and a private shool and a church field, which tend to be easy permissions.
(I rarely do private yards in towns as we have "no knock" laws everywhere around here. I don't know how peopl;e feel about that; I just don't bother as I've done well elsewhere, at least for now.
A bit long, but HTH
You should be able to find turn of the century USGS maps online. They show where the buildings and roads were.
A better bet is LIDAR. A good LIDAR dataset will show roadbeds from the 1700s that you may not see in the field unless you already know where they are. These often do not show up on the 30s aerials. Once you get into it, you will be amazed with LIDAR, but there is a bit of a learning curve, and the datasets have to exist for the area of interest (if they do, they tend to be free online). I'm sure you can find a bzillion LIDAR tutorials online (I'm lucky that a friend of mine is a signal processing wiz (he wrote software that runs on Hubble and JWST) and I fell into LIDAR very early in its existence).
Also, where I live, we have a used bookstore which has 1700s maps for sale, but that is a lucky resource. Maybe you have one as well. Maybe you can find old map listings on EBAY. You never know.
As for finding a virgin site, good luck. You will have better luck finding a unicorn. Not to say it doesn't exist, but it is rare. I believe every piece of public property has been hunted by someone, even if there is no reason to. I know I just hunt random fields with no reason to. It happens, I found a site with 20+ coppers kind of randomly, and it is one of my life projects to figure out what was there (so far, no luck), but it is rare. Also found a 4 reale Spanish silver in a random field. But this approach takes alot of time and patience (fortunately, I have those things when other projects aren't in the way (like now)).
I did once find an old public football field which was always locked, but by chance they were doing a resodding, and the gates were open for construction equipment. I got not only the top layer but the next layer after they had stripped off the top 6 inches for a total of 142 silvers from the site. Likely a virgin site or close to it. But oddly, only half the field gave up anything. Clearly the other half had been hunted well; why they did not finish the job I will never know. Possibly something similar in the past where they had only the time to do one half of it.
But luck, not skilled research. You have plenty of competition doing the same research with the same resources. You need to find an edge. No one is going to give up their edge, if they have one. I know I'm not, assuming I have one.
So, it can come down to a good machine and technical skill with it. Make sure you at least have that. You would be astounded at the number of silvers I have pulled from "hunted out sites". But I think that is technique and equipment, not research.
Back to research, likely your best bet is permission sites. Some people are dead fish and that winnows the competition a bit, but you see a hot site on the aerials on private property, even if the owner gives you permission, he'll often say "I've had 10 guys thru here already". Again, you need to be better with the machine than those guys. I do not think I have ever found a high yield virgin site on private property. My largets are 63 and 43 silvers respectively, but it is hard to believe they were virgin; they were so bloody obvious just by driving by, and a private shool and a church field, which tend to be easy permissions.
(I rarely do private yards in towns as we have "no knock" laws everywhere around here. I don't know how peopl;e feel about that; I just don't bother as I've done well elsewhere, at least for now.
A bit long, but HTH
old-raven
Full Member
- Joined
- Jun 23, 2025
- Messages
- 227
If it's aerials I seek Google earth is usually quite sufficient BUT in terms of finding the oldest maps I go straight to historical topos. The Arcgis living Atlas is my usual, it can get me as far back as the late 1800s locally. It also has map overlay (with modern aerials) as well as decent lidar. For more in depth lidar stuff Boydsmaps is great but the living atlas is frequently what you'll find me looking at comparing modern maps and aerials to the oldest stuff I can find. Frequently I'm looking for things that predate aerial photography and old black & white photos are typically very grainy with poor resolution. Not infrequently Google earth can find the old land scars/cultural features that are suggested by the old topo maps which is sufficient for me. The real work is getting out to sites of interest and literally running surveys with my detector and other tools to find what I'm looking for for. I've yet to find one mapping app or software that does it all but working with a few different ones is generally good enough. My ten cents
The area I live just didn’t start being developed until around 1900, and I haven’t been able to find any maps that go back farther then 1949. I’m still trying to understand lidar and how to find old homesites with it. I think it’s gonna be my best bet
old-raven
Full Member
- Joined
- Jun 23, 2025
- Messages
- 227
Boydsmaps. It's tricky to navigate at first but if you experiment with the various settings you'll figure it out. The lidar on boydsmaps is the best I've come across yet.
old-raven
Full Member
- Joined
- Jun 23, 2025
- Messages
- 227
They help with finding more than homesteads.
Lidar allows you to see past foliage and trees which can conceal old structural and cultural features. They permit a clear view of the surface of the terrain so you can better see the land scars, right angles, linearities, flattened spots, path ways, ditches etc. etc. lidar doesn't stand alone when looking at maps because sometimes vegetation can reveal old features as well but it's nice to be able to see all the features through a couple different filters, you'll catch things you otherwise might miss.
You're looking for things that clearly don't look natural on the landscape, signs of human activity
markinmichigan
Forum Supporter
Thanks old raven for the descriptive write up and link.
Mark in Michigan
Mark in Michigan
Rock Jock
Elite Member
A mapping software I use frequently in conjunction with Google Earth is CalTopo (https://caltopo.com/about/). I subscribe to it. I think it is about $50/yr. or some such. It has a number of stackable layers. My subscription level (pro) includes a parcels layer with boundaries and can be easily queried for surface ownership. It can also be used for backcountry navigation on a smartphone with dropped waypoints on downloaded maps. You can place markers, paths and areas. It includes stackable historical topos into the late 19th Century, current topos, slope relief/shading (Lidar), sat imagery and sundry other layers. These can be overlaid and adjusted for opacity so you can see through the stacked layers to compare them to one another. It has a geology layer, but I think it needs improvement because it isn't detailed enough for my tastes. A complaint about Lidar is that many places I like to play (such as the Rocky Mountains) may lack good resolution.
To further drive in the point for Ttedeton concerning Lidar, it presents the surface of the ground with no foliage canopy. With sufficient resolution you can see all manner of surface relief details. An example: Charleston, S.C. area. They've been fighting over this area for centuries. If you examine it in Lidar you see all kinds of military architecture from the War to Prevent Southern Independence.
I looked over old-raven's suggestion of boydsmaps.com and it is interesting. I like the different lidar treatments. I'll need to play in the website some more to discover more of its features.
Google Earth is my go to for overall map work. I post markers and other drafted shapes on it to keep track of investigations in various areas. A complaint about it is lack of updated imagery in some locales that I work. It's really a patchwork and some patches are older than others. Even so, you can go back in time and examine areas to see how they change with the seasons and tempests. Winter imagery is without leaves on trees. Snowy winter scenes may cast interesting shadows. Foliage patterns may reveal patterns of land use.
I think the edge randy seeks is best gained by research. Read history. If you seek old maps read military history and seafaring. I'm currently trying to access archives of schematics/plats from the Corp of Royal Engineers (British). They even have a couple of museums, variously. They go back pre-French and Indian War in America.
To further drive in the point for Ttedeton concerning Lidar, it presents the surface of the ground with no foliage canopy. With sufficient resolution you can see all manner of surface relief details. An example: Charleston, S.C. area. They've been fighting over this area for centuries. If you examine it in Lidar you see all kinds of military architecture from the War to Prevent Southern Independence.
I looked over old-raven's suggestion of boydsmaps.com and it is interesting. I like the different lidar treatments. I'll need to play in the website some more to discover more of its features.
Google Earth is my go to for overall map work. I post markers and other drafted shapes on it to keep track of investigations in various areas. A complaint about it is lack of updated imagery in some locales that I work. It's really a patchwork and some patches are older than others. Even so, you can go back in time and examine areas to see how they change with the seasons and tempests. Winter imagery is without leaves on trees. Snowy winter scenes may cast interesting shadows. Foliage patterns may reveal patterns of land use.
I think the edge randy seeks is best gained by research. Read history. If you seek old maps read military history and seafaring. I'm currently trying to access archives of schematics/plats from the Corp of Royal Engineers (British). They even have a couple of museums, variously. They go back pre-French and Indian War in America.
Ghostown
Junior Member
- Joined
- Aug 23, 2025
- Messages
- 76
Maybe this will help. https://louisianastatemuseum.org/louisiana-historical-center-maps
