On Monday 15 June, the 800th anniversary of the signing of Magna Carta was celebrated in much of the English-speaking world. In this article we look at one of its less well-known clauses – that relating to weights and measures.
Category: History
Dying embers and a few flying sparks
The concluding article of this series looks at the ignominious end of the UK’s attempt, began fifty years ago, to make the transition to a single, simple and universal measurement system.
The white heat cools
We review the events that followed the announcement in May 1965 of a change of Government policy on the adoption of metric weights and measures.
50 years on
Sunday 24th May will be the 50th anniversary of the announcement by the British Government that the UK was to “go metric” within 10 years. However, 50 years later we are still little more than half way there. Why has it taken so long? and when will it end?
1963 and “white heat” in Scarborough
Fifty years ago, the Government made a low-key announcement of a change in policy in relation to the use of metric units by industry. We consider how a speech by the Leader of the Opposition two years earlier had signalled the possibility of progress in this area.
Towards a metric Britain (in fits and starts)
We highlight some events during the UK’s prolonged transition to a single, simple, rational and universal measurement system, and look forward to an important anniversary later this month.
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A skirmish across the Pond
Readers may be interested in a recent exchange of views between Clay Rogers, a journalist with a newspaper in Iowa, and Paul Trusten, Vice President of UKMA’s sister organisation in the USA.
Whitworth’s forgotten legacy
Whitworth is famous for the eponymous screw thread, and for his promotion of standard measures and interchangeability that brought about an engineering revolution. Less well known are his enthusiasm for decimal measurement and his opposition to the introduction of the metric system in Britain.
A Biblical specification and a problem solved (almost)
We are justifiably proud in England of the legal principles laid down in Magna Carta in 1215, but less supportive of its command, “Let there be one measure …”. However, weights and measures laws are as old as civilisation. In this article, Ronnie Cohen looks at a unit of length from 3000 years ago, and makes a comparison with today.
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Inside the Commons
Have you been watching this series on BBC2 on Tuesdays at 9.00 pm? Three programmes have already been broadcast, with the final on due on 24 February. They show the workings of the House of Commons and there are a few surprises, or perhaps not.
Metric Views 