Set your clocks ahead one hour before
going to bed Saturday night. Spring's daylight
saving time begins Sunday at 2 a.m.
We get an extra hour of
daylight when we "spring forward" each March and then lose it when we
"fall back" in November. But have you ever wondered how DST began? Here
are some tidbits about its origins and pros and cons of these
time-changing events.
A series of events led to our modern-day
DST:
- Benjamin
Franklin, one of the founding fathers, suggested something akin to
daylight saving time in a
1784 essay.
- A postal
clerk from New Zealand was the first to propose modern DST.
-
Congress first put America's clocks ahead
one hour during World War I and (later for WWII). Why?
-
Congress enacted the Uniform
Time Act of 1966 to eliminate confusion about DST across the
country.
- Thanks to
this
act, DST in the United States now begins on the second Sunday in
March and ends on the first Sunday in November.