English units of measure (and a touch of Brit lit)

[justcarol67]

Sandra wrotes
> 
> > Sandra (off for a cup of tea - the cup is not a unit of 
> > measurement)
> 
Joe responded:
> Oh?  I thought a cup was 8 ounces.  :-)
> 
> When I was in primary school in the 1970's, the United States was
> really on the metric bandwagon. <snip>
> This lasted a very short while.  The mistake was trying to get
> Americans used to metric by having them convert measurements rather
> than taking them for what they are. <snip>
> 
> Ironically, nearly all tooling for American automobiles, and all
> manufacturing for that matter is metric.  My career in electronics has
> ALWAYS been metric.  It's only our everyday life that the conversion
> hasn't taken place.
> 
> Joe

What's still more ironic, at least in my view (and forgive me if
someone else has already pointed this out upthread): The inch, foot,
yard, pint, quart, gallon, etc., are *English* units invented by the
Anglo-Saxons (the mile is Roman but was used in England from fairly
early times)--a pity if the British yield to pressure and give them
up. On the other hand, I could never quite grasp the concept of stone
as a unit of weight, maybe because that one was never used in America
to my knowledge.

Here's a link on the history of English units of measurement that may
be of interest to some of you:

http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/custom.html

"Cup" isn't mentioned (maybe because it has to do with cooking rather
than commerce?) but fluid ounces are.

BTW, isn't there a kind of ironic tribute to the English pint at the
end of "1984" (where one of Orwell's few accurate predictions seems to
be the conversion or threat of conversion to the metric system in
England, or what used to be England when Winston Smith was young)? I
can't look it up--a teenager has borrowed my copy of "1984." And
another one, I am happy to say, has become a fan of Charles Dickens
and is trying to read everything he can get his hands on by that
author. I am not, however, going to lend him my copy of "Bleak House"
because he might change his mind! And besides, school is almost out
and I might never get it back.

To return to the metric system: "Give crowns and pound and guineas but
not your life away" works well in poetry, but I'm glad America never
adopted the (former) English monetary system. Metric does have its
uses! But I hope that Britain is content with 100 pence to the pound
and doesn't convert to the Euro. Hold on to your money! And your
history, your literature, and your language. It would be sad, very
sad, if they passed into the keeping of the former colonies.

Carol, who fears that Europe, and especially France, is falling into
another Dark Age