On Mon, 3 May 2004 11:22:40 -0600, "Jay Windley"
wrote:

I'm reminded of a (probably apocryphal) story about MIT engineering students
who were asked to design and construct a bridge using the unit of "smoot",
Professor Smoot being their instructor. His linear, volumetric, and mass
properties were the measurement units for the project. Steel had a density
of so many smoots-mass per smoots-volume, for example. In doing that, you
would gain a deeper appreciation for where these "accepted" values for
everything actually come from, and greater insight into the arbitrary nature
of practically any measurement system.

Your version is apocryphal. The truth is much less complex and much
more random.

Oliver Smoot was a student in 1958, when his fraternity pledge class
measured the Harvard Bridge (364.4 smoots, plus an ear) and marked it.
The markings are renewed biennially.

One smoot is 5' 7", in case you wonder.

An American baker is happy baking cookies in Fahrenheit. A French baker is
happy baking cookies in Celsius.

And the British baker is baking biscuits in Gas Marks.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer