{"id":522,"date":"2018-10-10T19:05:18","date_gmt":"2018-10-10T19:05:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/net4573.net.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/?p=522"},"modified":"2018-10-10T19:05:18","modified_gmt":"2018-10-10T19:05:18","slug":"measure-for-measure-units-of-measure-in-the-eighteenth-century","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/2018\/10\/10\/measure-for-measure-units-of-measure-in-the-eighteenth-century\/","title":{"rendered":"Measure for Measure: Units of Measure in the Eighteenth Century"},"content":{"rendered":"

Katie Miesner \/\/ AMH 4110.0M01 \u2013 Colonial America, 1607-1763<\/h4>\n

The eighteenth century was truly a time of cultural melding in the colonies. People from various parts of Europe with aspirations for a better life came to Virginia,\u00a0largely because of its flourishing economy. For immigrants, Virginia offered refuge from religious persecution, poverty, and social oppression. Shopkeeper Alexander Henderson operating the John Glassford & Company store in Colchester, Virginia,\u00a0 was an example of a colonist who came to America seeking more opportunities.<\/p>\n

When analyzing Henderson\u2019s shop ledger for 1760-1761, I was initially thrown off by the various units of measurements found in the accounts.[1]<\/sup><\/a> Certain\u00a0units such as inches, yards, and pounds sounded familiar while other words such as ells, fathoms, and hundredweights required a fast search into the project\u2019s glossary for clarification. I soon learned that a hundredweight (abbreviated cwt) is a unit of weight, a fathom\u00a0is a measurement of length described as outstretched arms, and an ell\u00a0was also used for length, typically in Scotland and England, gauged by\u00a0the length of a forearm.[2]<\/sup><\/a> I began\u00a0pondering how Henderson was able to keep track of all of these different units of measurement. In order to be successful in his line of work, he must have learned to\u00a0be patient and adaptive to numerous cultures\u00a0 and find ways to get around language and social barriers that come with dealing with lots of people from various backgrounds. To succeed in business, he must have had to do a lot of improvising in terms of consolidating fair\u00a0trade prices to reflect the various units of measurement depending on the item sold. The more I pondered these scenarios, the more I realized that the various units of measurement are synonymous with the colonists themselves.<\/p>\n

\"\"
A customer at the Colchester store purchased ells of roles and best osnaburg, two types of fabric (folio 131D).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Another customer purchased rope by the fathom at the Colchester store (folio 131D).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The United States Customary Unit system\u2019s\u00a0origin is similar to the British Imperial system.\u00a0Both systems trace their roots back to Roman\u00a0and Anglo-Saxon units of measure.[3]<\/sup><\/a> As I reviewed the accounts, I found that the most common type of length measurements used in the ledger were inches, yards, and fathoms. What\u2019s interesting about these types of measurements is that they are all units based on anatomy and dimensions of the human body. According to Russ Rowlett, a professor from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, \u201cthe inch represents the width of the thumb, [and] in many languages the word for inch is also the word for thumb.\u201d[4]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man<\/em> poses as an example of various anatomy-based measurements: light blue for fathom, dark blue for yard or half-fathom, and purple for ell. Original image from LeonardoDaVinci.net.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The foot is often thought of as being the length of a human foot, and the fathom as previously stated is a person\u2019s wingspan. The yard can also be interpreted as being the total distance from the end of the middle finger of an outstretched hand to the nose, or half of a fathom.<\/p>\n

What this says about the eighteenth century is that because of the lack of similar backgrounds and common education, units of measurement that\u00a0relied on anatomy were easier to use than\u00a0those dependent on math, numbers, or\u00a0previous knowledge. This idea predates the eighteenth century, but was revisited as a means to find commonality to overcome language barriers.<\/p>\n

Although there wasn\u2019t an official decree in terms of a unit of measurement in the United States until the Metric Conversion Act of 1975 by President Ford, a need for a practical system of measurements was certainly a priority for shopkeepers such as Alexander Henderson in eighteenth-century colonial Virginia.[5]<\/sup><\/a> The\u00a0adaption of colonial shopkeepers to numerous cultures as seen in the ledger proves that, while everyone has different origins,\u00a0 money and goods are a universal necessity.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

[1]<\/sup><\/a> Alexander Henderson, et. al. Ledger 1760-1761, Colchester, Virginia<\/em> folio 131 Debit, from the John Glassford and Company Records,<\/em> Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., Microfilm Reel 58 (owned by the Mount Vernon Ladies\u2019 Association).<\/p>\n

[2]<\/sup><\/a> History Revealed, Inc., Glassford and Henderson Transcription Glossary,<\/em> unpublished.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/sup><\/a> Russ Rowlett, Dr, How Many? A Dictionary of Units of Measurement<\/em> (New York, NY: University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, 1999).<\/p>\n

[4]<\/sup><\/a> Rowlett, How Many?<\/em>.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/sup><\/a> “Metric Conversion Act of 1975,” US-Metric Association, accessed March 23, 2017, http:\/\/www.us-metric.org\/metric-conversion-act-of-1975\/.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Katie Miesner \/\/ AMH 4110.0M01 \u2013 Colonial America, 1607-1763 The eighteenth century was truly a time of cultural melding in the colonies. People from various parts of Europe with aspirations for a better life came to Virginia,\u00a0largely because of its flourishing economy. For immigrants, Virginia offered refuge from religious persecution, poverty, and social oppression. Shopkeeper […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":523,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[72,71,13],"class_list":["post-522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-goods","tag-ells","tag-measurement","tag-textiles"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=522"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":705,"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522\/revisions\/705"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.cah.ucf.edu\/economyofgoods\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}