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

244 THE TIDE OF COMMERCE AND INDUSTRY (1920-30)
Within a year after the war most of the research projects diverted or
laid aside in 1917 had been resumed. They were increased now by con-
tinuing weapons research for the military, by the optical glass and gage
work, investigations on behalf of industry and the public utilities, and the
programs in housing technology, specifications, and simplified practice re-
cently established by the Secretary of Commerce.
in certain areas, as in textiles, automotive engineering, and utilities,
Bureau plans for research were to be modified as the decade pro-
gressed, owing to the organization or expansion of industrial research labora-
tories as the trade association movement grew, to increased research by
public utilities, and to the rise of private research organizations.68 Where this
occurred, the Bureau entered into cooperative investigations with technical
committees set up by the associations. Further assistance was rendered by
accepting increasing numbers of research associates to work in the Bureau
laboratories.
Despite its steady expansion of interest in industrial research, the
Bureau both before and after the war carried out considerable basic re-
search, much of it in determination and refinement of physical constants,
NBS Annual Report 1924, p. 22, was to say that the ceramic industry, for example,
had begun doing much of its own plant development and practical research, permitting
the Bureau to pay "more attention to the fundamentals required by the industry."
Dr. Paul R. Heyl of the mechanics and sound division making observations for his
redetermination of the constant of gravitation, probably in the block house constructed
behind West building for the project.