Many thanks to NIST, Ben Stein and Patrick Abbott.
https://www.nist.gov/
https://www.nist.gov/pml/weights-and-measures/si-units-mass
Special thanks to Patreon supporters:
Tony Fadell, Donal Botkin, Jeff Straathof, Zach Mueller, Ron Neal, Nathan Hansen
In 1875, the United States signed the Meter Convention, which essentially committed the country to using the metric system. In exchange, French scientists sent two platinum-iridium cylinders weighing 1 kg (known by their designations K4 and K20 from a set of 40 identical objects produced and sent around the world) to the United States in 1889. So even though everything you see and buy in the US is usually in pounds, all weights are traceable back to the K20 kilogram (by applying a conversion factor to get the pounds).
When I was in Washington a few weeks ago, I visited the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and encountered the K20, which is still kept there and used to calibrate all the mass standards in this country. I thought it was pretty cool.
Edited by Bill Connor
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