Wouldn't it be great if Pi was a simple short decimal? No more need
for that dodgy button on your Casio. It was one such attempt at
legalised reform that amounted to a Pi in the face for the Indiana
State Legislature. In 1897 Edwin J. Goodwin, a sometime crank
mathematician, approached his State Representative with an interesting
proposition. Goodwin had drafted a self-styled "New mathematical
truth" which amongst other oddities claimed that Pi was 3.2, which is
not even accurate to one decimal place. Moreover, Goodwin wanted to
charge a royalty to anyone who used his Pi, but if the State legally
recognised it, then he would exempt all Indiana textbooks from paying
the royalty.

	
He based much of his theory on that hoary chestnut of squaring a
circle (using a compass and ruler to find a square with equal area to
a given circle). Ironically, it had only been 15 years since Ferdinand
Lindemann had proved that circles cannot be squared in such a
manner. Goodwin may have been ignorant of this glitch in his
theorising, but so were the Representatives of the Lower House who
passed the bill unanimously.

	
Fortunately C.A. Waldo, professor of mathematics at Purdue University
happened to be in the House on the day of the bill's reading. When
invited to meet Goodwin, Waldo replied that he was already "acquainted
with as many crazy people as he cared to know." Waldo's timely
intervention spared the State Senate any further blushes upon the
bill's presentation to the Upper House. The Senators, suitably primed
by Waldo, peppered its reading with derision and bad puns. After a
half-hour of taxpayer sanctioned frivolity it was decided to move for
the indefinite postponement of the bill.