[fitswcs] History question about "UTC"

[Don Wells]

Dear FITS WCS friends,

A friend at NRAO asked me whether a historical statement in Wikipedia is 
correct:
--------

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coordinated_Universal_Time

contains the statement:

	The International Telecommunication Union wanted
	Coordinated Universal Time to have a single abbreviation
	for all languages. English speakers and French speakers
	each wanted the initials of their respective languages'
	terms to be used internationally: "CUT" for "coordinated
	universal time" and "TUC" for "temps universel
	coordonné". This resulted in the final compromise of
	using UTC.

That sounds vaguely urban-legendish.  How based in fact is it?

-------
The Wikipedia page has a footnote which is a link to a NIST page which 
says essentially the same thing.  My first reaction is that NIST must be 
an authoritative source, and so the story must be true.  However, my 
friend's remark is correct -- the story does sound somewhat like an 
urban legend.  As an ex-standards-committee-chairperson with some 
experience in the engineering of compromise agreements, I can also 
imagine that it might be true.   Can any of you on the FITS WCS list 
comment on this UTC story?

-Don Wells

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