LS as secretary of state, one page both sides, 7.5 x 12.5, May 1, 1821. Detailed letter to Albert Gallatin, then serving as US minister to France, in part: “I have the honor of enclosing herewith a copy of the Report upon Weights and Measures, submitted to both Houses of Congress at their last session…You will see by the account of Mr. Hassler’s measurement of several standard metres and toises, upon Troughton’s scale, that in the comparison between the English foot and the metre, he has come to a result intermediate between 39.37079 of Captain Kater and 39.3824 or 39.3827 of Prony and the French Academy. He finds it 39.3802. In the weight of kilogramme and the capacity of the litre I still find great uncertainty. You mention in one of your letters that by the weight of the English Sovereigns recoined at the mint in Paris…My conclusions from all this are that the kilogramme at all events falls a little short of 15440 grains troy. I hope to ascertain it with more perfect accuracy on receiving the copies of the platina metre and kilogramme from France.” In fine condition, with some light show-through from writing on opposite side. Accompanied by an engraving of Adams bearing a preprinted signature. The metric system had only just been devised in 1799 in France, and Europe was in the midst of adopting new units of measurement based upon it. Most countries turned to similar measurement standards, but they slightly varied from each other—as Adams laments in this letter—and a uniform, agreed-upon standard would not emerge until the International Conference on Geodesy in 1867. A fascinating letter that still resonates today, with America being the only industrialized nation to have not adopted the metric system as its official standard.
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