History
The BIPM was created on 20 May 1875, following the signing of the Metre Convention, a treaty among 51 nations (as of August 2008). It is based at the Pavillon de Breteuil in Sèvres, France, a 4.35 ha site (originally 2.52 ha) granted to the Bureau by the French Government in 1876, where it enjoys extraterritorial status, a status that was clarified by the French decree No 70-820 of 9 September 1970.
Read more about this topic: International Bureau Of Weights And Measures
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the Word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind.”
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809)
“the future is simply nothing at all. Nothing has happened to the present by becoming past except that fresh slices of existence have been added to the total history of the world. The past is thus as real as the present.”
—Charlie Dunbar Broad (1887–1971)
“While the Republic has already acquired a history world-wide, America is still unsettled and unexplored. Like the English in New Holland, we live only on the shores of a continent even yet, and hardly know where the rivers come from which float our navy.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)