Share this
Twitter
Myspace
Digg
Del.icio.us
Reddit
Slashdot
Furl
Yahoo
Technorati
Newsvine
Facebook
Export PDF
Print
E-mail
Tags
Article Index
Get ready for darker mornings and earlier sunsets
BY ANNE-MARIE COTTONE
NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM
On Sunday, Nov. 6 at 2 a.m., the U.S. officially "falls back" to standard time, giving us back the hour that mysteriously disappeared back in March when Daylight Saving Time began. Most people, of course, will set their clocks back before they go to bed on Saturday, Nov. 5.
But don't thank (or blame) Benjamin Franklin. While Franklin is generally credited with the idea of setting clocks ahead in spring to take advantage of the longer hours of daylight, Daylight Saving Time wasn't formally adopted in the United States until 1918, according to Snopes.com.
It wasn't an immediate success. Snopes reports that DST was discontinued the following year, although some states and cities continued to observe it. DST returned on a national level during World War II, when it was observed year-round from 1942-45, but there was no federal law governing the practice after that.
Finally, in 1966, Congress passed the Uniform Time Act, and while the dates for springing forward and falling back have been changed over the years, most of the U.S. has switched from Standard Time to DST in the spring, and back again in the fall, ever since.Author David Prerau has written the book on Daylight Saving Time: "Seize the Daylight." The book's website has some intriguing trivia about the effects of the time change on train schedules, crime, and voter turnout.
It also has an excerpt from Franklin's tongue-in-cheek essay to the Journal of Paris in 1784, in which he pointed out that much candle wax could be saved if people were to arise earlier during the summer months.
