By The Metric Maven

Mini-Bulldog Edition

A long time back I used to spend a lot of time at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Malibu California. The museum has a large collection of classical Greek and Roman artifacts. On display they had an example of a set of armor that a Roman soldier once wore. What immediately struck me was the size of the armor—it looked like it would fit a small woman. One of the guides told me that Roman soldiers were not all that large. It should be obvious to anyone who has a modern world view (I’m looking at you John Quincy Adams) that using body sizes as a measurement standard, is, well, ludicrous.

In 2013 a controversy unfolded when patrons of Subway in Australia, and later in the United States, discovered their footlong sub sandwiches were only eleven inches long.

Now, one must keep in mind that Subway appears to have only stated their torpedo with toppings was a “foot long” and did not define the length in inches (as far as I know). In this case, we must consult a reference to determine the distance in question. My favorite reference is Measure for Measure by Richard A. Young and Thomas J. Gover. They have these definitions for a foot:

Foot:

Ancient Babylon 353.9 mm

Canada Quebec 325.0 mm

Ancient Egypt 360.0 mm

France 324.8 mm

Greece Ancient Olympic 320.5 mm

Greece Ancient 308.9 mm

International 304.8 mm

Iraq Ancient 316.0 mm

Netherlands 283.1 mm

Phoenicia Ancient 495.0 mm

Rome Ancient 296.0 mm

Russia 304.8 mm

South Africa 304.8 mm

US Survey 304.8 mm

Assuming the eleven inch subs were measured in US inches, 25.4 mm per inch, then they are 279.4 mm. Well, Subway is still way too short, even when compared with the
foot of the Netherlands (283.1 mm – 279.4 mm) = 3.7 mm. This is close but no cigar for Subway. Even with all the variation in feet over the ages, they still managed to create a sandwich that is not even within the range of the most common definitions of a foot.

But the complaint was that the Subway sandwich offered was only eleven inches, and not twelve. Well, then let’s see if we can show that the sandwich is actually plenty
long and indeed a 12 inch sandwich by using “traditional measure.” The smallest definition of an inch I can find is for Spain at 23 mm per inch. This means that 12 Spanish inches is equal to 276 mm, and therefore the Subway sandwiches are indeed 12 inches long. As the complaint was that the sandwich was not 12 inches long, I must protest that when using pre-metric units, the Subway sandwich in question, is longer than 12 inches, and therefore endowed with enough length to justify its claim—at least in Spain.

But did Subway actually have the good sense to argue this way? Nooooooooo……they had to claim that “footlong is not intended to be a measurement length.” Then Subway changed their mind, and embraced the footlong rubric as a measurement length. Good move, because now I’m sure you have the backing of the former NIST director who embraces “multilingualism” in measurement, and does so specifically with Spanish. He must be on board with the idea that Subway in the US has met its claim, and Subway sandwiches are 12 Spanish inches long, and that’s good enough for US multicultural measurement. This conversion will finally make American footlong hotdogs match their name. Indeed there seems to be a human obsession with long hotdogs, currently 203.8 meters is the longest.

There is a nearby chain burrito establishment that sells “Burritos as big as your head.” They managed to avoid any measurement unit comparison by using a head instead of a foot. I’ve never found a unit called a head. But then the burrito chain just might mean “big as your head” as a metaphor—-perhaps? Many American men have this as their only excuse for unjustifiable measurement distortion when dealing with the opposite sex. The concern about the size of Subway sandwiches started in Australia, with good reason. They are a metric country and it seemed that rather than proclaiming their sandwiches are as big as your head, Subway tried to slip implied measurement into metaphor. As Australia is metric, one would think that Subway might realize that in metric countries comparing their sandwiches with feet might not be a good marketing strategy. Everyone knows a quarter pounder with cheese in France is a Royale with cheese. Why was Subway so culturally insensitive to Australians! They only managed to put their foot in their mouth. You know what I mean!

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If you liked this essay and wish to support the work of The Metric Maven, please visit his Patreon Page and contribute. Also purchase his books about the metric system:

The first book is titled: Our Crumbling Invisible Infrastructure. It is a succinct set of essays  that explain why the absence of the metric system in the US is detrimental to our personal heath and our economy. These essays are separately available for free on my website,  but the book has them all in one place in print. The book may be purchased from Amazon here.

The second book is titled The Dimensions of the Cosmos. It takes the metric prefixes from yotta to Yocto and uses each metric prefix to describe a metric world. The book has a considerable number of color images to compliment the prose. It has been receiving good reviews. I think would be a great reference for US science teachers. It has a considerable number of scientific factoids and anecdotes that I believe would be of considerable educational use. It is available from Amazon here.

The third book is called Death By A Thousand Cuts, A Secret History of the Metric System in The United States. This monograph explains how we have been unable to legally deal with weights and measures in the United States from George Washington, to our current day. This book is also available on Amazon here.