The Solanco Historical Society will hold a program and meeting on Saturday, March 15, at 1:30 p.m. at the organization's archives building, 1932 Robert Fulton Highway (Route 222), Quarryville. The program is free and open to the public.

Sisters Edith Kilby Bacon and Emily Kilby will present "Edith and Emily's Excellent Adventure." British surveyors Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon spent one month in the spring of 1765 determining and marking the boundary between Cecil County in the Calvert family's colony of Maryland and Chester and Lancaster counties in the Penn family's proprietary lands. Two and a half centuries later, Bacon and Kilby, retirees in their 70s, took up the mission to locate and visit all of the imported limestone markers Mason and Dixon had installed at mile intervals along that 23-mile border.

Their quest took several years of research and winter explorations, often in untended, difficult locations and sometimes involving repeated attempts. In March 2023, they finally completed the quest with a visit to a caged mile marker within the Octorara bends.

One of their most memorable finds was a battered marker in the middle of the Allan Myers quarry near Peach Bottom; the marker has since been removed. Another was the well-preserved 23rd marker on private property overlooking the Susquehanna.

The sisters' presentation will include an account of the original survey's history and techniques, as well as a marker-by-marker report on the 19 and a half that remain and three replacement stones.