Daylight Saving Time Started Overnight: ‘Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?’

“Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?”
That’s the title of a hit song by Chicago from the group’s debut album and it’s also a question that, had one asked it around 150 years ago, the answer could amount to as many as 40 different ones in a single state and many many more than that in a single country.
It was chaotic but there was not as much interaction between towns and cities at the time as there is now, no computers relying on clock signals and clock synchronization, no video conference calls across state and international borders requiring a means with which one could organize, coordinate, and plan a time.
Timekeeping was merely for immediate practical purposes. . The ancient Egyptians used a water clock known as a clepsydra that they used to measure the passage of time. The clepsydra was used to determine the start of religious ceremonies, mark the flooding of the Nile River, and organize working hours for the construction of the pyramids. Similarly, the Mesopotamians developed sundials and they used them to divide the day into different periods. The regular movement of the sun allowed them to track the changing seasons and plan their agricultural activities accordingly.
The concept of time zones was not a government invention; rather, it came out of technological innovation in the field of travel.
A standardized (or standardised in this case) time system was developed by British railways in the 1840s, followed by a similar movement by railroads’ General Time Convention in the United States in 1883.
The U.S. government didn’t get involved until the First World War that the government officially established the concept of standard time and time zones, including an allowance for Daylight Saving Time. Daylight Saving Time was repeated in 1919 but returned during the Second World War. It was pretty messy until 2007, when the government promulgated Coordinated Universal Time as the basis for standard time and here we are today.
Daylight Saving Time started in the wee hours of Sunday morning on most of the North American continent. This will give residents and visitors and extra hour of sunlight through mid-Autumn but the changeover is not without its perils.
While there are some pluses including more evening sunlight and lower energy use for those incandescent bulbs, there are more perils than some would care to admit.
There are numerous downsides to one’s health, which is the major reason that the American Academy of Sleep Medicine wishes to abolish the bi-annual time.
To begin with, our bodies are going to be misaligned with our natural circadian rhythms – basically what occurs with jet  lag, as if we traveled around the earth’s circumference and landed in a time zone one hour east of our own.
This results in mood disturbances and an increased risk of cardiovascular events.
This in turn can result in a higher risk of stroke and hospital admissions as well as an increase in inflammatory proteins, which help the body respond to stress.
As a result, the spring transition to daylight saving time results in a 6% increase in automobile accidents and dozens of fatal accidents could be prevented each year if we kept to a single year-round time,
A study led by Josef Fritz of the University of Colorado found – not surprisingly – that locations further west in a time zone are more affected by the change in time. This is because the sun rises at an earlier clock time in the eastern regions of a given time zone than in the western regions, which is thought to induce higher levels of circadian misalignment in the west than in the east.
Science tells us that sunrise should before 7:30 a.m. in the geographic center of a time zone but this isn’t always possible and some cities and states are simply in the wrong time zone due to either economic or political considerations.
For example, as anyone who has visited Detroit can tell you, the natural break between Eastern and Central Time should be at Detroit, not the Illinois border. The natural border for Mountain Time should be the Minnesota-North Dakota border, and Phoenix is right at the border of Pacific and Mountain Time.
The people of Newfoundland understood this issue right away. The Dominion of Newfoundland, whose capital, St. John’s, falls almost exactly midway between the meridians anchoring Atlantic Time and Greenland Time, voted to create a half-hour offset time zone known as Newf0oundland Time Zone at three and one-half hours behind Greenwich time in order to keep a semblance of order with the sun’s movement.
The problem with the United States and time keeping is that the country is realty big. The continental USA is so wide it covers four time zones, Alaska is one hour west of that, and Hawaii is two hours west of Alaska.  The continental United States should likely be five time zones at a minimum and six if you want to do it right.
If we didn’t have time zones at all, we’d be in the same boat as China, which is also very wide. China  covers the space of five time zones but the entire country is officially on Beijing Time except for the Xinjiang region. Beijing is in the east of the country so, in the west, the Sun appears to rise and set very late.
Case in point. A special state commission recommended that Massachusetts switch time zones “under certain circumstances,” moving to Atlantic Standard Time. This would be akin to adopting daylight saving time all year round. The move would have the Bay State join Nova Scotia, Puerto Rico, and others in Atlantic Standard Time.
A look at a map is revealing, New England – and Maine in particular –  is hundreds of miles farther east than other Eastern Standard Time cities, which is why it currently gets darker earlier in Boston han it does in in Buffalo, for example, despite the latter being farther north.
When it comes to standardization of time, however, the state of Indiana is the worst. Counties in Indiana – in contravention of state law – nonetheless select what time zone they wish to be in. Therefore, it’s possible for it to be 9:35 a.m., 10:35 a.m., and 11:35 a.m. – all in the same state at the same time.
Before railroads agreed in 1883 to standardize their time – in order to avoid collisions on the rails – communities regularly decided what their standard time was. They used the sun; noon was the time when it was highest in the sky. This meant that, with each degree that a person traveled west, 12 noon became a slightly different time.
Meanwhile, if you don’t like springing forward and falling back, get a sundial, or better yet, find an ancient Egyptian and ask him to build you a clepsydra.
Moreover, if this article doesn’t particularly make sense, please be advised I wrote it in the early morning hours after the time change to Daylight Saving Time and was quite bleary-eyed as a result.
(Drawing: Accura Media Group/Jonathan Spira)