Comments on: It's all smoot...

It's all smoot...

Steven C. Den Beste — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:25:50 -0800

"364.4 Smoots plus one ear" is the official length of the MIT bridge between Cambridge and Boston. In 1962, pledges to an MIT fraternity were ordered to measure the bridge using the shortest among them, Oliver R. Smoot, as a measuring stick. Since then, members of the fraternity have repainted the marks on the bridge twice a year. Oliver Smoot's daughter Sherry, eventually went to MIT but was not used to remeasure the bridge since she was shorter than her father. Her brother Stephen, also an MIT student, was too tall. Oliver, of course, was just right. He eventually went from being a unit of measure to controlling units of measure: in 2001 he was chosen to be chairman of ANSI and in 2003 he was selected to be president of ISO.

By: anthill

anthill — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:37:46 -0800

That's awesome. Thanks for the great post.

By: freebird

freebird — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:37:53 -0800

That's a great punchline.

By: madamjujujive

madamjujujive — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:38:18 -0800

What a great, quirky little post! Most amusing, thanks, SCDB.

By: danb

danb — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:42:24 -0800

An MIT friend told me the story of the bridge a couple years ago, but I didn't know the guy became chairman of ANSI! That's just too good to be true.

By: selfnoise

selfnoise — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:48:52 -0800

Ah, but can he get you booked on a sex cruise?

By: Steven C. Den Beste

Steven C. Den Beste — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:49:09 -0800

Google Earth recognizes the "smoot" as a unit of measure and will offer distances in that unit. (In case you're curious, a Smoot is officially 67 inches.)

By: QuarterlyProphet

QuarterlyProphet — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:57:25 -0800

What an excellent FPP!

By: vacapinta

vacapinta — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:57:54 -0800

Funny...I'm familiar with Smoots, seems everyone in Cambridge knows about it (or asks about it when they see the MIT bridge markings) but I had no idea Smoot went on to be involved in standards! Couldn't have been written beter.

By: nj_subgenius

nj_subgenius — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 13:58:16 -0800

A really good post - thanks!

By: eriko

eriko — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:01:29 -0800

eriko ~ -> units
510 units, 54 prefixes
You have: smoot
unknown unit 'smoot'

Boo! Must fix that. (typity typity) There.

eriko ~ -> units
511 units, 54 prefixes
You have: smoot
You want: furlongs
        * 0.008459596
        / 118.20896

Now, to submit the patch.

By: eriko

eriko — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:10:09 -0800

Oh, yeah. Just for the record. 55 exasmoot (and an ear) is almost one parsec, and the speed of light is 213085.53 smoots per nanofortnight. Now you know.

By: clevershark

clevershark — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:12:18 -0800

Yesterday I swam 1175 smoots! Working this unit into everyday conversation is going to take a bit of work.

By: clevershark

clevershark — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:13:30 -0800

Fortunately Google has a built-in meters to smoots converter.

By: caddis

caddis — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:15:28 -0800

I can't believe this has never been on MeFi before. I could swear I learned about it here, but the search for smoot turns up nada, other than the Google calculator can do unit conversions into smoots.

By: nonane

nonane — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:32:05 -0800

The bridge is usually referred to as the /Harvard/ bridge, or the Mass. Ave. bridge, not the MIT bridge. Anecdotally, this is because MIT students structurally analyzed it and gladly ceded any naming rights, although the chronology doesn't really work out (the bridge was built while the Institvte was still on its pre-1916 Boston campus near Copley Square). In the 1920s, it was so badly deteriorating that it was referred to as the xylophone bridge; a popular student anecdote involved a suicide-attempting student who changed his mind while falling from the bridge and was saved because a passerby threw in a plank loosened the bridge's disintegration, which he used to float ashore.

By: Dipsomaniac

Dipsomaniac — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:35:13 -0800

As it turns out, I am 1 Smoot in height.

By: YoBananaBoy

YoBananaBoy — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:41:45 -0800

Capital post — thanks.

By: quin

quin — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:49:54 -0800

Father, son, and daughter all MIT alums? Smart family. Also, great title and excellent post.

By: Relay

Relay — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 14:52:59 -0800

Ah, the Smoot Bridge. I remember when my brother (an MIT grad) first showed it to me many moons ago. Fun group of people, those Institute geeks.

By: frecklefaerie

frecklefaerie — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 15:32:16 -0800

Wow, awesome post!

By: Ironmouth

Ironmouth — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 15:40:58 -0800

I remember walking accross that bridge in early 2002 and wondering what the hell the markings were all about.

By: perissodactyl

perissodactyl — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 15:50:25 -0800

[awesome].

By: dirtynumbangelboy

dirtynumbangelboy — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 16:49:26 -0800

I am also one smoot tall.

By: etaoin

etaoin — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 16:50:27 -0800

Outstanding. Who says Web surfing is a waste of time? Great info, thanks.

By: darkstar

darkstar — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 17:09:24 -0800

Extraordinarily good post. Thank you! (I'm 1.1 smoots tall!)

By: jonmc

jonmc — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 17:09:48 -0800

I think we're all smitten with smoots.

By: rob511

rob511 — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 17:10:46 -0800

Oliver is about 65 (most sources seem to give the bridge-pledge-rush-haze date as 1958). Unless he uses gravity boots, I'm guessing the paradigm has undergone some contraction — and the Old Smoot ain't what he used to be.

By: peacay

peacay — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 17:38:09 -0800

Outstanding!

By: luftmensch

luftmensch — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 17:39:58 -0800

I am also a smoot! I feel the need to respond in this format. I hope someone asks for my height soon. Hm, now I just need an unusual measure of weight/mass...

By: evariste

evariste — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 18:27:46 -0800

Marvelous.

By: kenko

kenko — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 18:44:54 -0800

Luftmensch, I think you want the Potrzebie System of Weights and Measures.

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 18:50:49 -0800

Brilliant post, thanks.

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 18:51:20 -0800

Also - paging Ira Glass...

By: quonsar

quonsar — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 19:14:24 -0800

i just like to say SMOOT SMOOT SMOOT SMOOT!

By: Divine_Wino

Divine_Wino — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 19:25:57 -0800

Smootfilter

By: carsonb

carsonb — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 19:31:22 -0800

you can tell the quality of a bridge by the quantity of it's smoot.

By: carsonb

carsonb — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 19:32:54 -0800

- '

By: Kickstart70

Kickstart70 — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 20:00:24 -0800

Distance from Earth to Sun is 8.79056834 × 10¹⁰ smoots

By: adamg

adamg — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 20:08:21 -0800

Smoot retired his standards position last year.

By: riotgrrl69

riotgrrl69 — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 20:17:22 -0800

so now you know

By: gomichild

gomichild — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 20:20:16 -0800

What a cool story and post! I'm about one smoot high as well!

By: five fresh fish

five fresh fish — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 20:38:15 -0800

He must have been intensely interested in measuring things as a young man, and hence infamy enough to warrant such a stunt. He was a measurements geek!

By: rdr

rdr — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 20:53:01 -0800

In the 80's the bridge was limited to one lane each way because of it was structurally unsound.

By: dhammond

dhammond — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 20:53:08 -0800

Not only is this an excellent post, but it just reminded me about a guy I know named Tom Smoot. That name always gave me a a laugh and now there's another story about it.

By: Relay

Relay — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 21:00:07 -0800

In the 80's the bridge was limited to one lane each way because of it was structurally unsound. rdr I think you mean the Harvard bridge.

By: Mapes

Mapes — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 21:09:40 -0800

I think you mean the Harvard bridge. Same bridge.

By: blue_beetle

blue_beetle — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 21:22:25 -0800

Speaking of which, apparently the Millenium Falcon was able to do the Kessel run in just under 2.17577507 × 10¹⁷ smoots. That is all.

By: stenseng

stenseng — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 02:38:23 -0800

This is a tariffic thread, but I have to wonder how Hawley feels about all this...

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 03:44:15 -0800

And those students who originally did this, they were just so fantastically lucky that the shortest among them was actually named SMOOT! How fantastic is that? If he'd been a Higginbotham, or a Steinberg or a Williams, I dunno, just wouldn't have had that ring.

By: beno

beno — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 04:07:19 -0800

I wonder if he was really chosen because he was the shortest guy around or because he had the best name. Smoot. I love it, fantastic story, thanks.

By: deborah

deborah — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 10:23:34 -0800

Ha! I'm two inches short of a smoot.

By: clevershark

clevershark — Sun, 10 Sep 2006 12:25:17 -0800

So, is an ear roughly equivalent to an inch then? In that case I am one smoot and 2 ears tall.

By: Lord Kinbote

Lord Kinbote — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 07:35:54 -0800

In the Spenser novel Early Autumn, Boston-based mystery writer Robert B Parker sets an action sequence on the bridge. Early in the scene, Spenser describes the Smoot markings, and later, uses them to describe the action:

"There was another gunshot from five smoots away. I had my gun out and was running toward the Olds when I heard the MG take off with its tires squealing."