Ferdinand Rudolph Hassler Room, continued

The first years of Hassler's long involvement with the nascent scientific enterprise of the United States Government were spent in Europe, procuring instruments and books for the Survey. He exceeded the spending limitations that had been set for this trip, and the resulting controversy foreshadowed the friction between Hassler and a young, frugal American Government that would plague his career.

The Survey of the Coast was removed from Hassler's supervision after only two years, ending the first phase of a truly scientific survey. But after fourteen years of a poorly coordinated and technically flawed survey under military control, the original Survey of the Coast was reestablished, and Hassler was reappointed to superintend the operation.

Two years previously, Hassler had been asked by the President to compare the weights and measures in use at the principal custom-houses, and now, in 1832, the Coast Survey and the Nation's metrological work were combined in the person of Hassler.

But rather than producing just another study on weights and measures, Hassler made a more substantial contribution. Finding large discrepancies in the weights and measures in use, Hassler obtained the approval of the Secretary of the Treasury to construct standards of length, mass, and capacity for distribution to the custom-houses.

He broke the deadlock that had previously stymied progress in American weights and measures standardization and chose the English Imperial System over the metric.

Compelled by the force of common usage, he deviated from the Imperial Standards only in the area of capacity, resorting to the historical English wine-gallon and the Winchester bushel, for liquid and dry measures, respectively.

Congress was pleased, and in 1836, it formalized Hassler's standards work by creating the Office of Weights and Measures in the Coast Survey and by directing Hassler to construct standards for the states as well.

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