The Willamette Stone was a small stone obelisk originally located in the western hills of Portland, Oregon in the United States. It marked the intersection and origin of the Willamette meridian and Willamette baseline, which defined the grid system of sections and townships from which all real property in the states of Oregon and Washington has been measured following the Donation Land Claim Act of 1850. The Willamette meridian runs north-south from the marker, and the Willamette baseline runs east to west through the marker.
Famous quotes containing the word stone:
“And when his hours are numbered, and the world
Is all his own, retiring, as he were not,
Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art
To mimic in slow structures, stone by stone,
Built in an age, the mad wind’s night-work,
The frolic architecture of the snow.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)