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

56 FOUNDING THE NATIONAL BUREAU OF STANDARDS (1901-10)
The Coast and Geodetic Survey building, home of the Office of Weights and Measures,
in the 200 block of New Jersey Avenue, S.E., as Dr. Stratton saw it in 1900. The
Butler building, into which the new Bureau of Standards expanded, is probably the
structure next door. "Bushey House," at 23.5 New Jersey Avenue, is out of the picture,
down the street.
interested in giving information about a subject which, judging from your
correspondence, you know little or nothing about, than you are in securing
such information." 15
But that was years later. When in the summer of 1899 Stratton
arrived at the Office of Standard Weights and Measures, in the Coast and
Geodetic Survey building at New Jersey Avenue and B Street, S.E., where the
present House Office Building stands, its staff consisted of Andrew Braid,
officially Assistant-in-Charge; Louis A. Fischer, adjuster of weights and
measures; Dr. Frank A. Wolff, Jr., verifier of weights and measures (but then
spending most of his time on problems of electrical measurement), and four
others, a mechanician, an adjuster's helper, a messenger, and a watchman.
On October 28, 1899, Stratton replaced Braid, with the temporary title of
Inspector of Standards, at $3,000 per year.
Less than an hour was sufficient to tour the Office, see all its equip.
nlent, and comprehend its work. In Mr. Fischer's section "most of the ap-
paratus * * * on hand [had been] designed many years ago." There
was no "suitable instrument for the comparison of standards of length of
13 Letter, SWS, Dec. 27, 1920 (NBS Box 14, IPR).