Some interesting observations Han. May I make a few comments:
1) I checked Wikipedia (Dutch version) for the term Energie-eenheid [Energy unit] and found no reference to anything that was specifically Dutch. It listed BTU, Joules, calories etc. The unit 72,000 might hold a clue - if it delivered 72000 units in an hour, then it would deliver 20 units in a second (20x60x60 = 72000). Since a BTU is approximately 1055 J, it would be difficult to differentiate between BTUs and kJ. Are you able to estimate what the heaters would be used for? Nowadays a typical portable electrical heater delivers 2 kW. Are you able to identify where the heaters were made? It is worth remembering that even though there was considerable anti-German feeling in the Netherlands in the 1950's the Dutch pre-war industrial base and units of measurement were probably more closely tied to the German system than to the British system - a project for further research! 2) My father was in the Dutch Marines 1939-1947, but was a political prisoner of the Third Reich 1942-1945. He was paid compensation under the German Forced Labour Compensation program of 1999. I have copies of a number of documents that the family submitted to back up his claim. They included the charge sheet issued by the Nazi courts printed on A4 paper, while the letter from the Dutch Ministry of Defence dated 19-Jan-1948 notifying him of his pension was written on English Quarto paper (10 inches x 8 inches . 254 mm x 203 mm). I would suggest that you check whether you are looking at English paper sizes or US paper sizes (or both). 3) The British (and Americans who at the time were a series of British colonies) only adopted the Gregorian calendar in 1752! Finally, I have done some genealogical research at your sister archive in Arnhem. _____ From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Han Maenen Sent: 16 June 2008 19:45 To: U.S. Metric Association Subject: [USMA:41129] Discoveries in the archives When I am at work in the Regionaal Archief Nijmegen (Nijmegen Regional Archives) I find things that are interesting from a metrological vieuw. - Some time ago I was working with an archive that contains lots and lots of technical drawings etc. There I found an ad for heaters from the 1950's. In that time the kcal/h was mostly used for measuring the output of heaters. However, one of the ads used something that was called in Dutch 'Warmte-eenheden', which means Thermal Units. What thermal units? One of their heaters had an output of 72 000 Thermal units. These must have been either kcal/h or British Thermal Units. It may have been either. - In the fifties and sixties US Letter was fiercely competing with A4 paper as both sizes are present in abundance in the archives. Then, from the late 60's onwards A4 got the upperhand. - The drawings are in metric units, but in some of those drawings, something crops up in inches. - In a letter from the 1930's I read about a bridge, 100 English feet long, built somewhere near Nijmegen. - Around Nijmegen some field names are a reminder of the old units of area that were once used there. Field names are now used to name new housing estates and streets. - And of course, in all archives before 1820 we encounter our own old weights, measures and money. - The date notation of year-month-day was already used sometimes in the 19th century and it has been a standard in the archival world long before ISO 8601 made its debut. - In seventeenth century Dutch documents I sometimes encountered the ante meridian/post meridian time notation. And also old style/new style dates: the transition from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar. That took a long time, as the Northern Netherlands, of which Nijmegen was a part since 1591, was officially a Protestant nation, that only very reluctantly let go of the old calendar.
