In the late nineteenth century, both American and foreign manufacturers sometimes adopted metric units to meet the needs of international customers and demonstrate their own modernity. Others, particularly members of an organization called the American Metric Bureau, prepared charts and apparatus to introduce the unfamiliar system. A few Americans adopted the ideas of ardent opponents of the metric system such as Charles Piazzi Smyth of Scotland. By the end of the century, both metric and common units were taught in the schools.
