Here’s the history of DST according to Wiki:
Saving daylight was first mentioned in 1784 by Benjamin Franklin in a humorous letter urging Parisians to save money by getting up earlier to use morning sunlight, thereby burning fewer candles in the evening. Franklin did not mention daylight saving time-he did not propose that clock time be changed. His letter was in the spirit of his earlier proverb “Early to bed and early to rise / Makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
In 1905 builder and outdoorsman William Willett invented DST in one of his pre-breakfast horseback rides, where he was dismayed by how many Londoners slept through the best part of a summer day. An avid golfer, Willett also disliked cutting short his round at dusk. Two years later he published a comprehensive proposal for DST, which attracted many eminent supporters, including Balfour, Churchill, Lloyd George, and MacDonald. Edward VII also favored DST and had already been using it at Sandringham. However, Prime Minister Asquith opposed the proposal and after many hearings it was narrowly defeated in a Parliament committee vote in 1909. Willett’s allies introduced new DST bills every year from 1911 through 1914, to no avail.
World War I changed the political equation. DST was first enacted by a national government by Germany starting April 30, 1916. The United Kingdom soon followed suit, first observing it on May 21, 1916. On June 17, 1917, Newfoundland became the first North American jurisdiction to adopt DST with the Daylight Saving Act of 1917. On March 19, 1918, the U.S. Congress established DST from the last Sunday in March to the last Sunday in October. The wartime measure, however, proved unpopular among farmers, and Congress repealed it in 1919. Woodrow Wilson, another avid golfer, vetoed the repeal twice but his second veto was overridden. The history of time in the United States since then has seen several enactments or adjustments of DST, and one repeal, with similar politics involved.
Did you get that part about it being unpopular among farmers? That’s because farmers are smart. DST was enacted by POLITICIANS, no matter how many times they tell you it was for farmers. If farmers need more daylight, they get out of bed earlier. Real damn simple, but we have to complicate things the same way they are being complicated now by making Daylight Savings Time actually last LONGER than Standard Time. Which means that it is the NEW standard. Why not just leave it alone at the end of October, then you won’t have to worry about it anymore.
Arizona, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, and American Samoa don’t follow DST. They are the smart ones. Hell, in Arizona, you could probably do without the sun for a couple of extra hours anyway.
This is my Open Trackback Post for Monday, March 12th.
