My research indicates that the metric system was viewed in the United
States as "international", not particularly French though it was
acknowledged that their committee launched a survey and formulated such
a decimal system of measurement. Indeed, the early presidents, Hassler,
Sumner, Kasson, and others who spoke on the record addressed it as
international and part of the effort in which the U.S. was involved.
Jim
Pat Naughtin wrote:
On 2008/06/10, at 1:02 AM, Stan Jakuba wrote:
A sentence in a one-room schoolhouse, a section of the 1800s village
museum in Fairplay CO.
/Then down with every "metric" scheme
Taught by the foreign school.
We’ll worship still our Father’s God!
And keep our Father’s "rule"!/
Dear Stan,
Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington would have
rolled over in their graves when they heard this 'poetry' since they had
all worked so hard to get the metric system, and especially its decimal
character, adopted worldwide in the 1780s and 1790s.
Search for Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington in
the /Metrication timeline/ that you will find
at: http://www.metricationmatters.com/docs/MetricationTimeline.pdf to
see where their efforts fitted into the international development of the
metric system.
I think that from the standpoint of the USA it would be hard to describe
the metric system as foreign. I doubt that without the decimal
influences from the USA (especially from the three men mentioned above)
the metric system might not have got off the ground in France at all. I
should also mention that the international system of units — that
preceded the metric system by about 120 years — was an English
development in 1668
(See: http://www.metricationmatters.com/docs/CommentaryOnWilkinsOfMeasure.pdf ).
Cheers,
Pat Naughtin
PO Box 305 Belmont 3216,
Geelong, Australia
Phone: 61 3 5241 2008
Metric system consultant, writer, and speaker, Pat Naughtin, has helped
thousands of people and hundreds of companies upgrade to the modern
metric system smoothly, quickly, and so economically that they now save
thousands each year when buying, processing, or selling for their
businesses. Pat provides services and resources for many different
trades, crafts, and professions for commercial, industrial and
government metrication leaders in Asia, Europe, and in the USA. Pat's
clients include the Australian Government, Google, NASA, NIST, and the
metric associations of Canada, the UK, and the USA.
See http://www.metricationmatters.com/ for more metrication information,
contact Pat at [EMAIL PROTECTED]
<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> or to get the free
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--
James R. Frysinger
632 Stony Point Mountain Road
Doyle, TN 38559-3030
(H) 931.657.3107
(C) 931.212.0267
