Measures for Progress: A History of the National Bureau of Standards

AN: AUTUMN FIRE AND CONSUMERS' CRUSADE 89
Between and 1911,. ihspectors. from the' visitedi every
State of the: Union, over scales; weights;. an'di dry and liquidi
measures ili. 3,220 different and stores: They-
were badly- ihaccurate,,tliat: percent:
of the ha1F.the' dry measures, and a. liquid
were in error; or thatwith remarkable consistency these;scai'es measures
favored the: storekeeper: The B,hreau esthnated'. that. the; case pràt
butter alone the loss the' consumer;, thr.o;ugh or
weighing devices,
From: start;, and the- track:
of the
the
of
and New York of
their own andi other. States; foThawed. Over the: next 2 years almost. a hun-
dired articles: in- the periodical press reported. the weights and! measures
campaign across the:
As: a result of the widespread demand for better laws: and better
inspection of trade weights and measures in the wake of the survey, first
New Jersey and- then other States enacted the model law proposed by the
Bureau,, and State after State exhumedi and submitted for verification to the
Bureau, the standards that had been furnished them some 50 years earlier or
purchased new equipment for their State sealers.72 Answering urgent ap-
peals, the Bureau drafted a model weights and measures ordinance for
municipalities, and detailed its experts to first one and then another of the
States which requested aid in setting up their inspection departments.
A Bureau proposal to require that the net weight, measure, or numeri-
cal count of contents be printed on sealed packages was accomplished by an
amendment to the Pure Food and Drug Act in 1913, and in 1915 Congress
passed a standard barrel law; but efforts of the Bureau to promote national
legislation to define the weights and measures used in everyday trade, to
'°Louis A. Fischer, "Recent developments in weights and measures in the United
States," Pop. Sci. Mo. 84, 345 (1914), reported the Bureau's findings, State by State. See
also NBS Box 18.
For example, F. T. Cordage, "Serious leakage: short weights and measures," Good
Housekeeping, 48, 744 (1909) ;
F. Reichmann, "The necessity of the supervision of
weights and measures," Am. Stat. Assoc. 12, 146 (1910); Sloan Gordon, "Is the housewife
guilty?" Cosmopolitan, 50, 73 (1910) ; Francis J. Dyer, "The Government to the rescue,"
Good Housekeeping, 52, 334 (1911). In Reichmann's "Savings through proper super.
vision of weights, measures and standards," Ann. Am. Acad. Pol. Soc. Sci. 50, 94 (1913),
he estimated that as a result of reforms in New York State, annual savings to consumers
in the past several years had amounted to $15 million.
72 NBS Annual Report 1909, pp. 11—12.