In 1785 the Continental Congress adopted legislation that laid out the system for surveying its Western lands. This Public Land Survey System (PLSS), a method of subdividing and describing land in the United States, was used to break the land into portions that could then be mapped and sold. This system is used for all states where land was once in the public domain, land originally owned by the Federal government for the benefit of the citizens of the U.S. This includes most land in 30 southern and western States. Although most of this land has since passed from the government into private ownership, the PLSS rules of division are still in general use today, and legal land descriptions are usually written in terms of PLSS descriptions. This system is commonly called Township and Range.
Tip! The Manual of Instructions for the Survey of the Public Lands of the United States, 1973 documents current official procedures for PLSS surveys.Because this survey system is so regular, it's easy to use the legal description of your ancestor's land to place it on a map. To begin you will need a legal land description from the General Land Office for original land patents or a record of sale from the local county court house.
