An Old Timey Podcast - 50: Hello, Sunshine: Why We Have Daylight Saving Time (Part 1)

Episode Date: April 16, 2025

“OMG, the sun is up! Shouldn’t you be awake, doing productive things?” … that’s essentially what Benjamin Franklin shouted when he advocated to change the hours of human activity to take advantage of daylight. That idea later evolved into Daylight Saving Time. Since its inception, Daylight Saving Time has had its fans and critics. In this series, Norm refers to the critics as Sun Cynics. The fans? Sun Sluts. Where will you land? Remember, kids, history hoes always cite their sources! For this episode, Norm pulled from: Byrne, Kerry. “Meet the American Who Created Time Zones, Charles F. Dowd, Schoolmaster Set Clock for Mankind.” Fox News, December 17, 2023. https://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/meet-american-created-time-zones-charles-f-dowd-schoolmaster-managed-clock-mankind. “Full Text - Daylight Saving Time - William Willett’s Pamphlet,” n.d. https://www.webexhibits.org/daylightsaving/willett.html. Preprau, David. Seize the Daylight: The Curious and Contentious Story of Daylight Saving Time. Basic Books, 2006. “The Builder Who Changed How the World Keeps Time,” March 11, 2016. https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20160310-the-builder-who-changed-how-the-world-keeps-time. “Time Balls: The Rise and Fall of a Timekeeping Icon.” September 19, 2021. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-humber-58559814. “What Is Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) - and Why Does It Matter? | Royal Museums Greenwich,” n.d. https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/greenwich-mean-time-gmt. Are you enjoying An Old Timey Podcast? Then please leave us a 5-star rating and review wherever you listen to podcasts! Are you *really* enjoying An Old Timey Podcast? Well, calm down, history ho! You can get more of us on Patreon at patreon.com/oldtimeypodcast. At the $5 level, you’ll get a monthly bonus episode (with video!), access to our 90’s style chat room, plus the entire back catalog of bonus episodes from Kristin’s previous podcast, Let’s Go To Court.

Hear ye, hear ye. You are listening to an old-timey podcast. I'm Norman Caruso. And I'm Kristen Caruso. And on this series, I'll be talking about daylight savings time. Ew, what? I hate it. I hate it.

How many episodes are we talking here? Probably minimum seven. Oh, my God. Be truthful. Be truthful. You're planning two episodes, right? I never say anymore. I never promise how many episodes.

But I do promise it will be interesting and entertaining. You know what? I'm going to say, I've never been a fan. I don't like these switcheroo, jump ahead, jump back. Listen, save your judgments for later. I'm always judging, so that's not really an option for me. I know, but we have to get into something first, Kristen. Oh, okay.

We have to talk about your Instagram. Oh. Okay, why? Because you made a lovely post around the one-year anniversary of your old decrepit rotting podcast ending. You made a post about someone gave you a plant at the live show. Yeah, it was really funny. And it had grown over the year. And you were like, well, that's a very symbolic thing.

Yeah. But, you know, it's outgrown the pot and now it needs to be planted in the ground. Yes. Well, several. Actually, scratch that. many people commented on that post that that is a weeping fig and it will not survive outside. I just wanted to give a little announcement that the plant is safe and it is back inside the house. So the story was it was the let's go to court meet and greet.

So a lot of people came with gifts and obviously that was so sweet. This one person came with a, it looked like a twig shooting up out of a styrofoam cup and she was like, hey, this is for you, kind of. I mean, I just went to the bathroom next door, and I felt bad about using their restroom without buying something. So here you go. And so I put it in a planter because it was like, well, I don't want this to die. I have no idea what it is. And yet it did grow. And I was like, how fabulous. It can be outside and thrive, baby. And everyone was like, you will murder it. It will die. So now it is. just, I mean, it's doing its thing. So to the person who brought me that bathroom-related plant,

just know, she's still thriving, baby. We brought her inside. Who knows how long this plant's going to be with me? We don't know. As long as we don't do anything crazy, like, you know, try to make it survive a Missouri winter. Okay. You're on your own. You know, putting that weeping fig outside helps it build character. I agree, Norman. Yes. And that's what I say. Yes. And that's why I insult it every day because what doesn't kill it makes it stronger, don't you agree? You just yell obscenities at the houseplants. That's how

I treat all of those around me. Wow. Well, please give Kristen a follow at Kristen Pitts-Carruso. I do want to check out her amazing content. I did not know you were going to do this. This is very sweet of you. I just, if I were listening, I'd be like

Kristen put him up to this. This is very odd. Nope. I just love my wife. Weirder Well Do you want to Know what we say About those people

I'm sorry People are going to want us To get to this story Yeah But I do have to tell you That Norman and I have a theory I don't even want to call it a theory anymore I want to call it a fact

It's just a fact It's objective now The people who are like I love my wife I love my wife so much I love my husband Oh he's the greatest Oh

Like the people who are like Really into that and like post it a lot, they have the worst marriage on earth. There's trouble brewing in the relationship. It just seems like a bit much. You know, when I'm at Taco Bell, I don't have to tell you that I'm at the best place on earth, eating the most delicious food on earth, because everyone just knows. That's right. People know we have the best marriage of all time.

That's right. We don't have to tell them. But what you do need to tell them is more information about our Patreon. Oh, yes, yes. I'm sorry. I don't know why I did that weird voice. I've got four beverages with me today. I'm feeling a little kooky.

And if you want to support this small, cookey little podcast, and I know you do, go on over to patreon.com slash old-timey podcast. Once there, you'll find monthly bonus episodes. My God, will you be entertained? Did you know that there was once a movement to put clothing on animals? Yeah, for public decency.

It was a great idea. Listen to that episode now, won't you? And if you want more fun, we've got more fun, baby. We've got monthly trivia parties. And, you know, sometimes people do get a little mad because I throw trick questions into the trivia because I don't take competition seriously. And I like to sabotage.

We're kind of in some hot water, Kristen. There's a movement growing. Somebody created a petition about our tricky trivia questions. Well, I'm sorry. I didn't realize that everyone who listens is such a snowflake. Oh, wow. You've triggered them all, Kristen. Yeah, I'm going full all right.

Wow. No. But I do like to throw trick questions into trivia because I am a tricky lady. And also, also over there, you can get episodes ad-free and early. And of course you get the video. Right. Why wouldn't you want the video? Yeah.

See my new glasses. rumor has it we're very, very hot and we just love each other so much love him you can see all the love in the video okay now someone needs to reach out but like we once saw a van

and the van had a bumper sticker that said I love my wife and I said I wonder how many times that guy cheated on his wife because that's the only reason in my mind that's the only reason so if someone has some kind of alternative theory to that

please reach out. Yeah, let us know. Obviously, the alternative theory cannot be maybe he just really loves his wife. We are not accepting that as a theory. We're not going to take it at face value. Anyway, that's a Patreon plug is what that was. Patreon.com slash old-timey podcast. Yes.

Very good, Kristen. I'm very excited to see what you got going on here today. You didn't sound very excited when I announced the topic. You know what? I decided I need to be polite. And so I'm going to act like daylight savings time is something that I want to know more about rather than want to abolish. Thank you, Kristen. Thank you for building me back up after tearing me down in the introduction.

By the way, happy 50th episode of an old-timey podcast. Hell yeah. You know, it's a great honor for me, Normie C, to tell the story on our 50th episode. And I can't think of a more interesting topic than daylight savings time. Shout out to Lenny Marie in the old-timey podcast fan group on Facebook for suggesting this topic. Oh. Also a big shout out to the book, Seize the Daylight, the Curious and Contentious Story of Daylight Savings Time, by David Preroux. Okay.

Roroh, that is a pretty cute title. I like it. Mm-hmm. Most of my information comes from that book. Believe it or not, not too many people have written books about daylight savings time. I wonder how many people are going to want to listen to a podcast episode about it. I hope it's a lot. I promise you, it's interesting.

Okay. Picture it, Kristen! It's the summer of 1784 in beautiful Paris, France. Oh, okay. Do do do do do do do do do do do do do. We're at the luxurious hotel Valentinua. It's a private mansion owned by a house. family of rich, snobby, fart-sniffing aristocrats.

Oh! And during this time, a portion of that estate was being rented out to a very special guest. The 78-year-old American minister to France, Mr. Benjamin Franklin! Oh! Yo, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. Whoa, no singing. Oh. Benjamin Franklin is actually fast asleep.

He's probably enjoying some rest after a late night of debauchery. Kristen, did you know Benjamin Franklin? really liked having sex? Oh, yeah, that's like one of the fun facts you learn as soon as you become an adult. That's right. Really, it's like getting red-pilled. Your whole worldview changes. Uh-huh, uh-huh.

He may have had at least a dozen mistresses during his lifetime. Oh, during his lifetime. Yes. That's not. Not at the same time. No one could keep up with that. Well, I was going to say, well, no, I was going to be rude. Continue, please.

Okay. Future topic? Ugh. Ben Franklin's sex life? Ew. Anyway, he was sound asleep, but his restful sleep was soon interrupted. By a loud noise! Oh! Hmm.

Benjamin Franklin grogily opened his eyes and, oh my God, it's so bright in here. Oh, it's so bright. Benny Boy couldn't believe it. He was like, geez, did somebody break into my room and light a bunch of lamps? Is this a social experiment? Then Benjamin Franklin rubbed his eyes again. He put on his spectacles, and he looked around. And that's when he realized it was in fact not a social experiment.

That bright light was coming from the sun. Well, no shit. Well, hang on. Okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Benjamin Franklin was kind of annoyed at first. He was like, ugh, someone must have forgotten to close the shutters last night before bed. I'm going to give him a big old spanking later.

But then Franklin checked his watch, and he was astonished to learn that it was only 6 a.m. And he was like, and so he ran over to his bookshelf, and he grabbed an almanac, and he quickly flipped through the pages. Wait, was this his first time in France? Like, I don't understand why he's so shocked by this. I'm telling a story. Calm down. Oh, I'm sorry. All right.

So he's flipping through the pages. And wow, holy shit, yeah. According to the almanac, the sun was sorry. supposed to rise around 6 a.m. that day. And Ben Franklin thought to himself, wow, man, imagine if I had slept until noon like I usually do, I would have missed six whole hours of sunlight. To Ben Franklin, it would have been such a waste, because if he had slept in, he would have had probably stayed up later in the evening, burning through candles and oil lamps. And then, like any old white guy would do, Franklin ponder, hmm, I wonder how much money

people in Paris could save if everyone woke up when the sun came up. So, he started doing some math. History hoes, follow along. You don't look amused at all. No, no, I hate this. What's wrong?

How much money we would save if we all... Oh, God, he's wanting me to get up earlier. Burn a damn candle, you're rich. I know you're rich, Ben Franklin. He's trying to save money for the people of France. None of them are interested, I promise. I promise.

Well, let's hear them out, okay? He started doing some math. History hose, follow along. Okay, so according to the almanac, the sun rose between 5 and 6 a.m. From March 20th to September 20th. So that's 183 days the sun rises early, okay? And then Ben Franklin guesstimated that, I bet most people oversleep the sunrise by seven hours every day. which is an insane guesstimate, and that's not true at all.

But, hey, let's just go with it, okay? So you have 183 days of early sunrise. You multiply that by seven hours a day. That's 1,281 hours of missed sunlight, Kristen. Holy smokes! Where did he pull that seven hours out of? Out of his big, sexy butthole, okay? The historical records say nothing about the sexiness of his butthole, I assure you.

There's still stuff to be found. And Franklin was like, whoa, if people are oversleeping by seven hours, that meant they were staying awake at night seven extra hours. They were burning through candles faster than a greasy pig. So Ben Franklin estimated there's 100,000 families in Paris. So 100,000 families times 1,281 hours of missed sunlight equals 128 million hours of burning candles. So far, you have combined. all of the things I hate the most. Yeah.

Math being thrust upon me. The threat of waking up earlier. And the question of, well, how much money are we as a society wasting on this? On the enjoyment of laying in bed for a while. Which, by the way, I'm sure everybody else had like normal jobs, Ben Franklin. They weren't just like sleep until whenever they wanted to. Yeah, look, his math is terrible on this.

But I'm making a point here. Also, greased pig. Faster than a greased pig? Yeah. Have you ever heard that? I don't think you'd ever heard that before you said it out loud. Burning through candles faster than a greased pig. How many candles do greased pigs light at a time?

I meant it as like you're burning through candles faster than like the speed of a greasy pig. I guess I didn't really say it right. But, you know, maybe we should test it. Maybe we give a greasy pig a lighter and some candles and see what it can do. I see what happens. And he's like, I just want to light two at a time. That's all I want. So he does some more calculations.

Uh-huh. And he finally concludes that by not waking up with the sun, people were spending 96 million French dollarie dues per year on candles, Kristen. Adjusted for inflation, that's about $200 million. Very expensive. I am just blown away by how much I don't give a shit. Now, was that math suss? Absolutely. But it didn't matter.

Benjamin Franklin couldn't believe it. He's like, we have to solve this problem. But how do you convince people to take full advantage of sunlight? Benjamin Franklin certainly had some ideas, and he laid them all out in what he called the economical project. Number one. A tax on every window that has shutters. to keep out the sun. What?

That's right. Number two, families may not buy more than one pound of candles per week. Why? And number three, every morning as the sun rises, all church bells should be ring a ding dingin. And then, if that's not enough, let's bring out some cannons into the street and blast them. He did not say that. Yes, he did. To quote, wake the sluggards effectively.

Sluggards! Yes, you, Kristen, you are a sluggard. Slicking, slimy, sleeping in bed. Wow. Okay, I have always vaguely felt like I did not like Ben Franklin. And I could never quite tell why. I mean, I love electricity. I see nothing wrong with it.

Now I know I was right. This guy's an asshole. Leave people alone. So this whole story reminds me, Don't you have a funny story about how your parents woke you up for school? No. I have trauma. I have trauma from for the high crime of enjoying sleeping.

Didn't your mom pull on your toe hairs? That was when I was older. No, when I was really young, my mom used to threaten me, threatened me bodily harm. She would threaten to take me to school in my pajamas. because I didn't want to get up, didn't want to do the whole thing. And she would say, I'll take you to school in your pajamas. How would she enforce that, though?

What do you mean? How would she enforce it? How would she force you to go to school in your pajamas? Well, it was like, Kristen, we are leaving in whatever many minutes. I'm going to take you out the door. So she would drag you out forcibly. Presumably. But here's the thing.

I had this sleep shirt that I loved. And this is okay because I'm, I was a child. It had, it was a big long sleep shirt. Yeah. And it had a picture of sleepy from, you know, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Ah, yeah. And it was a very cool thing to wear, but I knew it would be very uncool in second grade to wear to my school.

I think that would have been okay in second grade. I was far too cool. Anyhow. Anyhow, yeah, my mom always threatened. And I always kind of knew. Like, she probably won't, but she convinced me she was just crazy enough, you know, just, just mad enough. I was like, she might do it. And God help me, that'd be embarrassing.

It's all about instilling fear in your children. That's how you get stuffed in. Well, Kristen, you'll be happy to know that Benjamin Franklin's little idea never went anywhere. He only wrote about it in a letter to the Journal de Paris. People found the whole thing kind of funny, and that was it. Yeah. So you might be wondering, why the hell am I telling you this story? Because he brought that same shitty idea to America.

And in America, we were like, oh, you know what? What a great way to have a terrible time. Let's do it. This is like when people are like, oh, you know what, cold showers are better for you, and then we do cold showers. The cold showers are awful. Yes. Yeah, that was a big thing a couple of years.

go, yeah, wake up with a cold shower. It's helpful. I tried it once. I'll never do it again. It was the worst shower I've ever had. Uh-huh. We know. Mm-hmm. Well, I'm telling you this story, Kristen, because Benjamin Franklin kind of made history here because he was one of the first people to suggest that the government should forcibly change the hours of human activity. Oh. Today, 240 years later, the United States government does alter the hours of human activity, with a little thing called daylight savings time.

Now, you might be asking, Normy C, what is daylight savings time, or DST? And the answer is, it's exactly how it sounds, you donut. Altering time to save daylight. But instead of waking up early, like Ben Franklin suggested, we all set our clocks forward one hour in the spring and backward one hour in the fall. And this allows us to take full advantage of,

the sun. You may still be confused about this very complex idea, Kristen. So calm down, I'm going to explain it for you. Let's say on a typical day, the sun rises at 5 a.m. And you, Kristen, wake up at 8 a.m. You've already missed three hours of sunlight. I'm fine with it. What a waste. I'm fine with it! You a freeloader. And then you go to work and you do whatever it is you do, and then you come home at 6 p.m. And then an hour later, at 7 p.m., the sun sets. Well, that fucking sucks. You only got to enjoy one hour of sunlight after your dull, boring, lifeless office job.

Now, consider that same day, but with daylight savings time active. Now the sun rises at 6 a.m. And you wake up at 8 a.m. as usual. Now you've only missed 2 hours of sunlight. Ooh. And then you get home at 6 p.m. But now the sun sets at 8 p.m. That gives you 2 hours of sunlight.

in the evening. Holy smokes! Now, advocates for daylight savings time, aka sunsluts, they say it does a lot of good. Uh-huh. It helps with conserving energy. It's good for agriculture. It allows for more recreational time. It lowers crime. It increases voter turnout. It reduces car accidents. It helps the economy. It makes people healthier. Hold on. You want to go through that list again? What stood out to you there? How does it lower crime? Because, Kristen, crime doesn't take place that much during sunlight.

People usually wait till nighttime. Okay. And so the longer the sun is out, the less crime there will be. Do you see? Now, opponents of daylight savings time, aka sun cynics, like you, Kristen, claim that many of those advantages are minimal at best, probably not worth changing the clock. They say daylight savings time interrupts sleep patterns.

Yes. And increases health risks. And in turn, that actually decreases productivity. Hell yeah. I'm loving these sun cynics. You're a sun cynic? Yeah, I think I am. I think I'm a suns slut.

You would be. So in this series, Kristen, let's dive into daylight savings time. Who came up with this wacky idea? And how? Who's right? Who's wrong? Should we still use daylight savings time? Or should we go back to Ben Franklin's idea and have cannons blasting in the streets to wake us up every morning?

Kristen, any thoughts before we dive in? I've given you all my thoughts and more, baby. You sure have. I should have just skipped that line. Uh-huh. Okay. Kristen, you know me. I love me some context.

Hmm. Could eat it all damn day. Okay. And I thought to my son. Well, before we can understand daylight savings time, we should probably learn more about time itself. Oh my God. What is time anyway? What's the deal with time?

She's a construct, right? Yeah, everything's made up in our society. How did we come up with time? How do we even decide that it's 2 p.m. right now? Is it a deep state conspiracy? What do you think? Do you know anything about it? I'm keeping an open mind, baby.

Good, good. Okay, so before we talk about daylight savings time, here's a brief history of time. Egghead disclaimer. My God. I'm not a mathematician. I'm not a scientist. I'm not a timekeeper guy.

I'm not a wizard. Oh, my God. But I'm going to do my best to explain these concepts. Norm, this sounds like a video from like some mom who's like, I'm not a doctor. I'm not a scientist. I'm not a researcher, but I've decided I'm not vaccinating my kids. Listen, this is why I give a disclaimer.

Okay, okay. And if I mess up, history hose, please roast my ass until I announce I am stepping away from content creation. Wow, okay. All right. Anyway, it all began a long, long time ago, Kristen, with our ancestors. They needed to find a way to measure the length of a day, you know, for hunting and stuff. And the very first way to do that was by observing the sun's shadow

on a vertical object, like a tree or an obelisk. When the sun's shadow was the shortest, it was noontime, or midday. Easy peasy, right? Yes. And then the ancient Egyptians came along, and they had this newfound thing

called society and civilization. And now all of a sudden, they needed more accurate timekeeping. We got to keep track of work hours. We have to coordinate religious ceremonies. I need to schedule my guitar lesson. Those Egyptians loved their guitar lessons. And how?

Usually on Tuesdays. And so the Egyptians split each day up into two sets of 12 equal units. There was the daylight period, 12 hours of daylight, and the nighttime period, 12 hours of night. And to measure those hours, they came up with something called a sundial, which allowed hourly tracking of the time using the sun shadow. But these aren't the hours you or I are familiar with. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Because these hours were always changing. They actually called them temporal hours. So in the summertime, a daytime hour could last 69 minutes. Nice. A nighttime hour, 51 minutes. Depending on the time of the year and the tilt of the Earth's axis in relation to the sun, some days were longer than others. And this concept of temporal hours

It survived for several centuries. The ancient Romans did it. Medieval kingdoms did it. It's kind of a wild thing to think about having different lengthed hours. But hey, if it worked for my ancient Roman ancestor, Normani Big Dicius, I approve. You ever looked into your ancient Roman ancestors? I believe I have, actually. Yeah?

Who'd you find? Kristen Big Tidious. Naturally. We might be related. We, oh no. Way down the line. Uh-oh. might want to look into that. Normani Big Dickius was a big fan of, what was yours again?

Kristen Big Tidious. I was going to say it wasn't a sophisticated joke, Norm. Yeah, it's true. But, you know, eventually, Kristen, people kind of grew tired of that whole temporal hour idea and declared, there's got to be a better way. And so in the 13th century, scientists introduced the idea of 24 equal length hours to use year round, 60 minutes, per hour. And with this revolutionary idea came an invention that swept the world. The mechanical clock. Now, hold on, hold on, hold on. Okay, I'm going to ask questions that maybe you won't be able to answer. Why exactly were some hours shorter or longer than others in the old way? Because so they split the day up into like daylight and nighttime. And so depending on the

time of the year, sometimes daytime was shorter, sometimes daytime was longer. I kind of love that. Well, and so that's why they changed how long the hours were. Oh, shit. An hour of sunlight in the winter is like 51 minutes. Summertime, it's 69 minutes. I didn't want to like that so much, but I do like that a lot. Why do you like that?

That's not consistent at all. It would be terrible. Well, okay. here's a thing. People say sometimes they talk about being in a season where you're wanting to do this, a season where things are kind of slowing down, a season where you're building up. And I feel like maybe it's mostly an American thing, but we are like, go, go, go, extreme. Produce, produce, produce. Regardless of what else might be going on, regardless of what's going on around you. and this seems like it actually takes into account

what's actually going on around you. Sure, it takes the seasons into consideration. Yeah, so maybe you don't have to work as hard during certain times of the year. And other times you kick it up a notch. I see. Is this really so bad? I mean...

You say yes, yes, it is. I'm saying for like record keeping and scientific stuff, If the hour is freaking different all the time, that would be really annoying and hard to keep track of. Not all the time. It would be during specific seasons. Yeah, but even if it changes for month to month that's annoying, you want to make it consistent. And so that's what we're working towards.

So now we have 24 equal length hours. We have mechanical clocks, which was not possible with constantly changing hours. And mechanical clocks spread like wildfire. folks had them in their homes. They could see what time it was whenever they wanted. They spread faster than greased pigs. Thank you. You finally used it correctly.

The PLEBs had to look at public clocks in town squares all across the world. How embarrassing. So next time you look at your watch or your phone, you better appreciate it. You can just check the time whenever you want. Yeah, I'm going to be like, Rich, and look at my watch. G-L-A-M-O-R-R-O-U-S-O-O-U-S. The more only sings the most modern hip songs on this podcast. I'm checking the time on my phone.

Oh, here's the day as well. Glamourous. Oh, God. Floss de, flaude. Anyway, before you rudely interrupted me. So early mechanical clocks, they weren't super accurate. In fact, they only had one hand. But it kind of didn't matter because everything kind of moved a little slow back then.

You know, travel news information. So time accuracy wasn't super important. Now, while people did enjoy their mechanical clocks, time was actually different from town to town. So towns would set their clocks at noon based on the sun's highest point. And for a while, that worked. But soon clocks got more and more accurate, and the discrepancies between what the clock said and what the sun said became more and more apparent. Uh, fun fact, Kristen... Wow, wow.

I don't know if you know this, but there's actually only four days in the entire year. year where the sun and the clock agree on what time it is. Oh. Did you know that? No, I didn't know that. Yeah, that's crazy to me. So people had to reset their clocks constantly. It was really annoying.

And people declared, there's got to be a better way. Fear not, Plex, because soon enough, in the late 1600, some eggheads came up with a solution. It was called mean time. Meantime? Meantime. Okay. Meantime was not the time of time.

you yell insults at your neighbor for using his leaf blower at 8 a.m. No, actually, meantime was the average length of all the days in a year. To measure meantime, astrologists at observatories would take a peek at the sun and use very sciencey conversion tables to convert suntime to meantime. And then those eggheads at the observatory would drop a time ball to let everyone know what the most accurate time was. High up in towers or on top of buildings, a metal ball would slowly drop, and when it hit the bottom of a pole, it would signify its noon. Modern example, Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve.

Dropping the time ball for Happy New Year. He's not still around, is he? Oh, Dick Clark's dead. Yeah. But I think it's still called Dick Clark's. Well, isn't that sweet. Okay. Nice little dedication.

Sorry. All right. Meantime, observatories, time balls. for more accurate and consistent timekeeping. But it also opened up a Pandora's box, Kristen, because this was the very first time that man had messed with time itself. And it was only going to get worse.

Meantime seemed to keep the sun and the clock more in harmony, but it still didn't solve that problem of different times in different cities and towns. You know, if it was noon in Chicago, maybe it was 1150 in St. Louis, or 12-17 in Toledo. But again, it didn't really matter all that much when people are traveling by like horse and donkey and rickshaw

or, you know, whatever. Greased pigs. Who cares, I say, who cares? But then in the 1800s, we had a little event called the Industrial Revolution. And with it came two new inventions that made accurate timekeeping more important than ever. The first was a new form of communication.

The telegraph, also known as Do-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D. That's an actual translation. Oh, wow. Norm, that was beautiful. Thank you. I don't even want to know how long it took you to memorize that. Three weeks.

Three weeks. I've been working hard on this script. It was incredible. People can now communicate instantly. Now, you history owes might be wondering, why is accurate timekeeping such a big deal with telegraphs? Sounds like a bunch of fear-mongering to me, Normie. see. Well, Kristen, here's an example for you. Let's say I'm working in the Twinkie factory

here in Kansas City, Missouri, and I come into work, and dear God, we have run out of cream filling. Oh. So I whip out the old telegraph, and I send a message to our sister factory in Tulsa, Oklahoma. And I say, Mayday, Mayday, we are out of cream filling. I repeat, we are out of cream filling. We need a delivery ASAP. Oh, my God. And let's say I send that message at 9 a.m. Sure. When the factory is open. Yeah. But, oops, the local time in Tulsa is about 15 minutes slower. It's only 8.45 a.m. there.

No one would be around to get my urgent cream warning. Think of the lives that would be lost. Think of the slaughter. Think about the Twinkie industry. It would collapse. They'd have to fill those Twinkies with blood that day. Human blood. I think we can find some better alternatives.

No, no, that's the only way. That's the only way. Well, that's what's at stake here, okay? Sure. So, yeah, telegraphs required accurate time across areas. But the other Industrial Revolution invention, and the one that would change time forever, was railroads. And, ooh, boy, do those damn trains cause some trouble? How do you schedule trips or coordinate shipments when every damn town has their own local time?

It's kind of a mess. Yeah, that's fair. So during the mid-1800s, railroad companies came together and they said, Let's go to court? No, they said, there's got to be a better way. So sorry. Who are they going to sue, time? I don't know.

That's why I said it with no confidence. I was like, I don't see why they'd go to court over this, but I don't know. Father time? Yes. You've been served. Oh, heavens. So in November of 1840, the Great Western Railway of England became the first railroad company to adopt

Railroad Time. They declared all of their trains in the United Kingdom ran on the local time of London. And soon every other railroad company in the UK did the same thing. And then other countries were like, damn, that's a good idea. And so they did the

same thing. Of course, they didn't use London's time. They used their own country's capital for their time, but same thing. And eventually, railroad time came to be known as standard time. Sound familiar? Oh, yeah.

And boy, was that helpful. It sure made scheduling trains a lot easier. However, this new railroad time, it didn't become, like, the official time of a country. It was just something the railroads used. So now people had to keep track of two times, their local time and the railroad time. Now, if you lived in, like, London, you know, railroad time and local time were exactly the same. So no big deal. But if you lived like an average time.

hour east in like Bootyville or something? Bootyville. Yeah, I'm assuming that's a town. They call it Edinburgh. Kristen. That was just a true. That is in Scotland. I know it is.

It's north of London. How dare you insults the fine history hose from Edinburgh? Mm-hmm. I believe you're the one who called it Bootyville, so. I know. Bootyville is its own thing. It's got two beautiful hills and then a creek running through it. All right.

That's enough. You don't want to be there when the volcano goes off. I'll tell you that. Oh, damn, there's a volcano. I heard there's a real nasty mudslide in Bootyville back in... This is so immature. Say, if you lived an hour east in Bootyville, your time could be different by a couple minutes than railroad time, you know? So watch manufacturers, they're like, fine, we'll just make watches that keep track of both.

It has the local time and the railroad time. Oh. And then public clocks in town squares also showed both times. Wait, is that why on old-timey watches you've got like the regular guy and then you got a little guy kind of in the corner? Oh, maybe. You're telling me you didn't come across this. You had time to write a Bootyville joke, but you didn't have time to look into the old time. I'll use my time wisely.

Thank you very much. I don't know that you do. Okay. Show of hands. Do you like the Bootyville joke more or the watch fact more? I'm assuming. Do you want to Google it? No.

Continue. Okay. Okay. So yeah, keeping track of two. times, that kind of caused some confusion. Because some people went by railroad time and some people went by local time. It was pandemonium. Here's an example. I would abuse this. How? If I was late somewhere, I'd be like, oh, sorry, I'm on railroad time. It's funny you say that. In Dorchester, England, a defendant in a lawsuit showed up to court, only to find out the judge had already

ruled against them. And the defendant was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, I showed up on time. And the court was like, well, we schedule our trials with standard time. We don't use local time. Well, the defendant appealed and he won. He was given a retrial. There we go. Yeah. I'm just talking like showing up for work every day.

I would just mix it up depending on what time I showed up. You're going to abuse the two-clock system. Before I'm inevitably fired after day three. Yeah, but go ahead. Well, despite these hiccups, the new railroad standard time system was working pretty well overall for countries all over Europe. But over here in the U.S. of A, it was not that simple, Kristen. Why? Because relative to countries in Europe, the United States was a bigger boy. And that meant time differences between cities and towns was much larger. So like the difference in time between

Nancy France, an actual town in the eastern part of the country, and the time in Quimper, France, in the western part, it's not much, maybe a few minutes. But the time difference between Washington, D.C. and San Francisco, it's a huge, unbelievable. You think we'll put tariffs on time? I sure hope so. That would be a five-head move right there. That'll teach him.

Fug it, we're putting tariffs on islands full of penguins. Let's put tariffs on time, too. Those penguins deserve it, I'm sure. And to make matters worse, the United States had a lot of railroad companies, Kristen, and each company used their preferred local time for scheduling the trains. So like the Pennsylvania Railroad used Philadelphia's time. By 1872, there were more than 70 railroad times across the United States. If you were traveling from Maine to California, you'd have to change your watch at least 20 times along the way.

It was a mess. People hated it. Harper's Weekly Magazine said, quote, Any traveler trying to make his way across the nation was doomed to bewildering confusion. And so railroad companies across the United States cried out. They didn't say, let's go to court. They said, there's got to be a better way.

Yes, Kristen. And that's when a hero emerged. Oh, his name was Professor Charles F. Dowd. Okay. of Saratoga Springs, New York. Charles F. Dowd may or may not have been well endowed. Oh. But he was a man of education.

He graduated from Yale and then became the principal of the Temple Grove Ladies Seminary, which is now Skidmore College. You ever heard of Skidmore College? Yeah. Are you trying to make a Skidmark joke? I wasn't, actually. I was just curious if that was like a well-known... You had a little twinkle in your eye.

Don't try to deny it. You say the word Skidmore. you're kind of thinking... You're kind of asking for me to make a joke here. You're kind of asking for it. You're forcing my hand. But, you know, in his spare time, Professor Dowd, he liked to try and solve problems.

So when he heard about all the timekeeping problems on the railroads, he decided to come up with a solution. Time zones! Okay. Professor Dow was like, okay, so the Earth rotates 360 degrees every 24 hours. So that's 15 degrees every hour.

So if I split the United States into zones every 15 degrees, we can adjust the time in each zone based on the time in Washington, D.C., and then everything will be in sync, kind of, sort of. So he slapped down a map, he drew straight lines every 15 degrees, and that formed four zones. The eastern time zone, the central time zone, the Mountain Time Zone, and the Western Time Zone. Central was one hour behind Eastern.

Mountain was one hour behind Central. Pacific was one hour behind Mountain. And under Professor Dowd's plan, if it was noon in Washington, D.C., it was 9 a.m. in San Francisco. Eureka! Now, this plan made sense science-wise, but not capitalism-wise. Why? Because the railroad companies were like, This time zone line, it runs through my territory.

And oh, oh, this time zone line, it's too far west. Can you move it a little, please? Huh. You seem puzzled. Yeah, but I also don't understand math very well. You don't understand math? Keep going. Okay.

Over the following years, the railroad companies further refined Professor Dow's plan, they modified the time zone. line so they followed kind of already established railroad territories. Eventually, the railroads unanimously backed the time change. And they chose Sunday, November 18th, 1883 as the day to synchronize all of their clocks. Because that's when the least amount of trains would be running. And it became known as the day of two noons. Really?

Mm-hmm. That day, clocks around the country were set back anywhere from one minute to 30 minutes, depending on where you lived. Most people were happy to do it. The New York Tribune wrote, No reasonable person can doubt that the change will be to the general advantage. To have four time standards of railroad time throughout the country, instead of 53,

will be an immense saving of labor and worry. Okay, that's fair. Yes. But just like the United Kingdom, this was not an official government change. It was just for the railroads. It was up to individual communities to decide if they wanted to follow

railroad standard time or not. Believe it or not, several preachers hated the new standard time. They smashed watches and protest. They proclaimed railroad time was not God's time. What? Mm-hmm. You're going to have to explain that to me. Local time was more in sync with how the sun moved. Okay. And so that's why they considered it God's time.

Railroad time. Sure. Tweaked it a little bit. So it wasn't exactly in sync anymore, but it kind of worked better for the railroads. And also some people were like, how do the railroads have the authority to like have their own time, you know? Yeah, I mean, honestly, that is fair. Sure. You got to feel real good about the size of your nuts to tell me what time it is.

No doubt. All of a sudden, I'm ready to smash my watch now, but only one that I don't like. Absolutely. that mini mouse watch for 1994. The mayor of Bangor Main, he threatened to jail anyone who rang church bells on railroad standard time. He said, you better be following the local time, buddy,

when you ring those bells. So despite a few folks who were cuckoo bananas, most people preferred to follow the new railroad standard time. Professor Charles Dowd was declared a hero. He got free train rides wherever he wanted. But sadly and ironically, he died in 1904 at the age of 79 when he was hit by a train. Why was he hit by a train? He guessed he didn't see it coming and he got by train.

What? No, no, I'm fine. He was 79. Maybe he couldn't see it. Do you want to laugh over there? No, I don't. No. No. Well, Kristen, these new time zones, they were a hit.

And then in 1884, U.S. President Chester A. Arthur, he thought, what if the entire world followed the same time? And then they used time zones. So that year, he invited delegates from around the world to the International Meridian Conference in Washington, D.C. Boy, that sounds fun. The goal of this conference was to decide a common zero of longitude, a prime meridian that all countries could use to set their time and get the whole world in sync. You remember longitude lines in school? Hell yeah. Prime meridian. And I'm not about to forget about latitude lines either. Oh, great job.

And with trading becoming more and more global, you know it only made sense for the whole world to be following the same time. During the conference, the United States suggested that the whole world should sync up with the time in Greenwich, England. That's where the Royal Observatory was. That's where mean time originated 200 years earlier. It was kind of the gold standard of timekeeping. And the French were like, Sacribleu! We will never use English time in France.

But that objection did make any difference. By a vote of 22 to 1, Greenwich was the chosen location. Thus, Greenwich Mean Time, GMT, became the prime meridian for timekeeping around the world. Time zones adjusted clocks accordingly in each country. Good for Chester A. Arthur. If you had asked me, what did this man accomplish in his presidency, I would have said I have no clue, probably nothing, but this is big.

Absolutely. I think it's very helpful for business, getting everyone on the same time. Now, France was pretty miffed about it. They wouldn't adopt the time change until 1911, 27 years later. They followed their own time for 27 years, and they're like, okay, we give up. That seems kind of bitter for no reason, right? Well, there you have it, Kristen. For the very first time, all the countries around the world had synchronized their

clocks together for business, for communication, for transportation, for science, the world had finally united and defeated our greatest enemy. Time. Then a guy named William Willett decided to fuck it all up. Who's William Willett? He was a home builder from Chislehurst, England, just south of London. He ran a family business known as Willett Building Services. And he earned a reputation for building quality homes. Houses listed for sale would often advertise that they were Willett built. Needless to say, William Willett was Wheely, Wheely, wealthy. And as a wealthy chap, William Willett naturally had an affinity for horseback riding.

It's inevitable once you get money, you always get into horses. It's true. Usually onto them, but, you know, into them can happen. Absolutely. Is that a have sex with a horse joke? Just make sure we're on the same page. Yeah, thank you so much for spelling that out. You're saying rich guys. I was imagining you letting that joke come out and then you move on.

But no, we've stopped completely. We've explained the joke. I want to think about it some more. I want to take it in. Uh-huh. And I'm going to pull it out. Okay, great. Every morning before breakfast, William Willett would take his horse out and ride through the woods.

The fields, the town. And one summer morning in 1905 during his daily horseback ride, William Willett couldn't help but notice that he was kind of alone. It was 7 a.m. The sun was up, but besides an occasional milkman or mail carrier, everyone else was still inside. And as he strolled past houses in town, he saw that curtains were drawn, shutters were closed,

blinds were down, and that made William Willett kind of sad. No, asshole. leave everyone alone. You see, Kristen. No, no, people want to sleep. It's not something you need to worry about William. Well, he is going to worry about it because he really enjoyed natural light.

Great. Then you go enjoy it, William. God, I hate this. Man, you are a son cynic, for sure. William Willett liked to incorporate natural light as much as possible in his custom homes with large open spaces. And William Willett thought, gee, sure is a shame that people were wasting the best part of the summer day. And just like Benjamin Franklin more than 100 years earlier, William Willett wondered if there was any way he could convince people to wake up earlier and enjoy the sun.

Mind your own business. How about mind your own damn business, William Willett? How about that? How about that? But Kristen, he has another concern. You know, he wants you to enjoy the sun in the morning, but he's also like, I wish people could enjoy it in the evening after they get off work. Because when they get off work, there's only a little bit of daylight left. You know, children can't play, gardeners can't garden, butthole sunners can't sun their buttholes.

That's very important. Yeah, it gives you nutrients and boosts your mood. It does all sorts of great things. In fact, even William Willett fell victim to this horrible situation. He said he barely had time to play his favorite racist sport, golf. Oh. So, what do you do? Do you just wake up early if you enjoy the sun?

Yes. Not according to William Willett, Kristen. He cried out, I need to be in everybody's business, and I deserve to be in everybody's business, and also there's got to be a better way. Okay. Yes, he said there's got to be a better way.

And that's when it hit him. He was like, hey, we should set the clocks forward one hour during the summer. And that would let people wake up on time and see the sun and enjoy it more after work. Wow, incredible! Now, before you fall head over heels for William Willett, Kristen, and you start flashing them your hooters or, you know, whatever you want to do, you need to know that this idea was not new. William Willett does not deserve sole credit for day.

light savings time. Ten years earlier, an entomologist from New Zealand named George Vernon Hudson pitched moving the clocks forward two hours in the summer so he could catch more bugs after work. Gross! Well, why are you shrugging? Why are you shrugging? I, okay, I have examined this. We've been recording for a while now, and I'm like, why am I so effing triggered by this? You are super triggered. And I think what it is, is maybe, I haven't had a long time to cook on this, so I could be a little off. But I do think maybe part of it is me being undiagnosed ADHD for the vast majority of my life and so many things that, like, help me out. Yeah. Maybe have looked weird to other people and wrong to other people along the way.

Like what? Okay, well, I'm trying to think of examples. Like I remember when I was a kid and I needed to get a chore done, I would do this weird thing with time where I'd wait and wait and wait. And then I'd try to make a game out of it for myself by like looking at the clock and I was like, if I can do, I can clean my whole room in seven minutes. And, you know, that's a weird thing. But it worked for me to kind of gamify stuff.

Way too much caffeine consumption helped out. I don't, I'm, I'm not saying it's ADHD related necessarily, but I just understand the thing of different people like different things. A lot of people try to make waking up early into this virtuous thing. And like, if you sleep in, then somehow that's bad. And like even if that person who sleeps in is really productive at midnight, which again, why do you fucking care if they get anything done at all? Do you understand what I'm saying? Sure. Sure.

You're saying mind your own damn business. Yes. I am saying mind your own damn business. And if you love getting up early and seeing the natural light, wonderful. Guess who's stopping you? No one. Literally, no one is stopping you. It's not just about waking up early to see the sun.

It's about enjoying the sun in the evening as well. I get that. You know, people have to work. Businesses aren't going to change their hours. just because you want to hang out in the sun. Okay. So maybe he wants to help society. That part I appreciate.

Mm-hmm. Not a ton, but I do. Do you see what I'm saying? I see what you're saying. You have your own little system for doing things, and you're saying I would never want to foreset on anybody else. That's my thing. No, I would.

That's your thing. Oh, you want everyone to do it. This is my toxic thing. Sure. Whatever's great for me, everyone else should be doing. I think that's a human thing that a lot of us do. But there's also like, okay, if somebody sees something that could help society, why not pitch it? Why not say, hey, what do we think of this idea?

It could improve our lives. That's all William Willett's doing. Okay. Let's hear him out. All right. Shall we? So I mentioned this entomologist, George Hudson, who wanted to pitch the clock two hours so he could catch bugs. That never caught on, though.

he only mentioned it in an academic paper, and it didn't really gain much traction. Now, some people already moved their clocks forward for personal use. And you know who did that? King Edward the 7th. Okay. He did it all the time at his Sandringham estate so he could stay out longer to hunt. And now we have William Willett suggesting the same idea. But unlike those men before him, Willett wanted to make it happen, cap'n.

across the United Kingdom. William Millett spent the next two years writing down his crazy idea, and in 1907, he used his own money to promote and self-publish a pamphlet, entitled The Waste of Daylight. Hmm. Let's take a look inside. Ew. So here's the plan.

Every Sunday, during the month of April, everyone should set their clocks forward 20 minutes for a total of one hour and 20 minutes. Wait. set their clocks forward 20 minutes for a total of one hour and 20 minutes? Every Sunday during the month of April, so four Sundays, everyone should set their clocks forward 20 minutes. I got you. And then in September, do the same thing but back. William Willett rattled off all the benefits of doing this, and there were plenty.

First, extra daylight would make people healthier and encourage exercise. It would conserve energy. William Willett wrote, Everyone rich and poor alike will find their ordinary expenditure on electric, light, gas, oil, and candles considerably reduced for nearly six months in every year.

In fact, William Willett estimated that Brits would save 2 million pounds annually on energy. Adjusted for inflation, $200 million. Very expensive. Then William Willett got all philosophical. He truly believed adjusting the clocks was for the betterment of society. He wrote, quote,

While daylight surrounds us, cheerfulness reigns, anxieties press less heavily, and courage is bred for the struggle of life. What? Ooh, a little dramatic there, William. Early readers of the pamphlet had some questions. So some were like, ooh, geez,

changed the clock four times in April. That's kind of annoying. Yeah. And what if I forget one week? Oh, it calls all sorts of problems. William Willett was like, it's not a big deal. Sailors have been changing their clocks for years on the high seas. Other people are like, well, if people want more sunlight, why don't they just wake up earlier? William Willett was like, absolutely not. His problem with the waking up early idea was that it didn't do anything for sunlight in the afternoon. For that to happen, businesses would have to change their hours in the summer. And William Willett, Let's believe there was just no way to force businesses to do that. The waste of daylight flew off shelves across the United Kingdom. It was a hit, Kristen.

And less than a year later, on February 8, 1908, a bill was brought to Parliament entitled The Daylight Saving Bill. Before taking a vote, Parliament formed a committee to study the effects of such a bill on English society. And they learned that most people kind of like the idea. idea. There were even some celebrity endorsements. Ooh! People like Winston Churchill. Okay.

He stated, An extra yawn one morning in the springtime. An extra snooze one night in the autumn is all that we ask in return for dazzling gifts. Oh. Wow. King Edward the seventh loved it. You know, he was already doing it himself. Sure.

He's a big fan. He was like, yeah, fuck it. Let's have the whole country do it. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. He was a super fan. Doyle wrote, quote, It seems very strange that in the course of the world's history, so obvious an improvement should never have been adopted.

Industries from around the country weighed in, too. Medical societies believe daylight savings time would help with eyesight. It's way better to use natural light than artificial light. Plus, extra sunlight could help combat rickets and anemia. Businessmen were on board, too. They thought extra sunlight. would increase morale for workers whose, quote, lives are spent in close and somewhat dark conditions of city life.

God damn. Ooh, that's depressing. But as a former corporate worker, I get it. Yeah, there is nothing more depressing than showing up at work when it's dark and leaving when it's dark. Yeah, exactly. Railroad companies were in, too. They said daylight savings time would increase passenger travel and also decrease the cost of lighting stations and cars. However, all of these supporters did unite behind one very

badly needed change. They were like, um, hey, uh, I don't think we should change the clocks four times in one month. Can we just do it once? And so the committee modified the bill. So now the plan was one hour at 2 a.m. forward on the third Sunday in April, one hour back at 2 a.m. on the third Sunday in September. The daylight savings bill was a slend. Dunck, Kristen. People loved it. Industries loved it. Celebrities loved it.

This should pass easily, right? Yeah. Not so fast, sun sluts. Because here come the sun cynics. Like you, Kristen. Honestly, though, the more you talk, the more I was like, this does seem like a good idea. Oh, really? Really.

I hate that. You flipped. I don't know that I've fully flipped, but truly the more you talked, I'm kind of like, well, it's not. so bad. Well, here come the sun cynics. Okay. So first, there's a very obvious complaint. They're like, dude, we just figured out how to synchronize time across the world. And now you want to fucking change it again.

Oh, that would suck. Yeah, yeah, okay. The scientific community was mortified at daylight savings time. One astronomer said daylight savings time was a scheme cooked up by late risers. and that time should not be messed with. A scientific journal commented, oh, what's next? Are we going to raise the temperature 10 degrees in the winter so we feel warmer? Honestly, that's kind of funny.

It's not a bad argument. A clock is a scientific instrument. Yeah. A thermometer is a scientific instrument. Yeah. You're fucking with clocks. How about we fuck with thermometers? A newspaper wrote that daylight savings time would alter dinner and tea times,

which would quote, shake the British Empire to its foundations. If I get my Earl Grey an hour later, I'll be fucked! I mean, if there's one thing I've learned from history, you don't mess with British tea. You're asking for trouble, okay? Theater owners believed attendance would go down because who wants to see a show when the sun's still out? Yeah, I, for one, have never watched TV while the sun. was shining. Nope, nighttime only, baby. International businessmen were like, look, daylight savings time's all well and good, but it only works if like everyone else does it too. If just the UK does it,

it's going to be hard to like coordinate with other countries, business deals and shipping and. Yeah, it'll be chaos. Yeah. A few members of parliament spoke out. One dude had a very, very specific scenario. Are you ready? Yeah. He's like, okay, so get this. Let's say a woman, is giving birth to twins. And the first kid pops out at 1.50 a.m. And then 10 minutes later, the second kid pops out. But oops, we have to set the clocks back so the second kid was actually born at 1 a.m. Not 2 a.m.

But technically they're the older child. So how do we fix that? This could affect inheritance. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Right? Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, I see what he's saying, but that is such a very specific scenario. Well, but okay, he didn't have me until he said inheritance. It would affect inheritance. And you know this would be a legal trouble. You know people would be looking at themselves in the mirror saying, let's go to court. There's got to be a better way. Yeah, for sure. So technically, the kid is older, but when they write down the time of birth, it would be an hour before.

So on the paper, they're actually younger. It could cause some problems. Sure. But Kristen, would you like to know the biggest and most powerful opponent of daylight savings time? I would like to know. Farmers. They're always causing trouble. Okay, I don't know if you experienced this growing up, but I had always heard that we only have daylight savings time because of the farmers, as if the farmers loved it and they wanted it.

They had to have it. That is something I almost said at the beginning of this episode. But you held back. Why? I was about to make some joke about farmers, but then I kind of felt, because, like, for some reason, I've always thought it was like, farmers in the Midwest made a big stink. And I thought, well, I myself am in the Midwest. Correct. So it wouldn't really make sense for me to go after them.

So I just kind of held that. I kept that under my cap, which also keeps the sun out. Very good. It does protect you. That's right, Kristen. Farmers hated daylight savings time. They were livid at the very idea. So that thing we heard growing up about, oh, farmers want a daylight savings time. That's all bullshit. Okay. Farmers hated it. They were like, hey, we've always worked around the sun. We're not going to change our schedule just because of what a clock says. Daylight savings time would allow farm workers to leave work early while the sun was still up, and many tasks around a farm can only be performed while the sun's still out. It also changed market schedules, which could force farmers to potentially wake up even earlier than they already were just to get stuff done.

One opponent said, Will the cows give their milk earlier because of Mr. William Willett? Will the chickens know what time to go to bed? To Farmers, William Willett was just a, quote, dangerous crank. The Parliament Committee met 13 times and heard testimony for more than 40 witnesses on daylight savings time. And ultimately, the committee decided daylight savings time was, quote, desirable and would benefit the community. Hmm. William Willett was thrilled.

He exclaimed, holy fish paste, this is the greatest achievement of my life. life, but then in came the dream crusher. His name was Prime Minister Herbert Esquith. He was a certified son cynic. He thought daylight savings time was a big waste of time, literally. He thought it was inconvenient. He thought the benefits were minimal at best. And so he told Parliament he had no intention of passing a daylight savings bill. And with that, the bill died. But William Willett wasn't about to give up that easy, Kristen. He kept campaigning across the country to get a new bill on the table. Sure enough, the following year in 1909, a new daylight savings bill emerged in Parliament.

But this time around, the bill died in committee by a single vote. Nevertheless, William Willett persisted. He kept writing. He kept campaigning. And in 1911, another bill for daylight savings appeared, but with a fresh new name. Now they were calling it Summer Season Time Oh, that sounds nice! It's summer season time,

I'm gonna tell you this rhyme. Oh. It's like Barbie, but with a new hat. You know? But once again, the bill failed. It failed again in 1912, and again in 1913, and again in 1914.

Poor William Willett. It seemed as if no one wanted to give his ideas, a chance. By 1914, he had published the 19th edition of his pamphlet, Waste of Daylight. But the United Kingdom just wasn't going for it, but maybe other countries would. That year, William Willett was invited to the International Congress of Chambers of Commerce in Paris. And there, he gave a speech on daylight savings to delegates from 37 countries. He handed out translated copies of his pamphlet, and that led to some new international fans. The German said,

Das is Spice. The Spanish said, Marveloso. The Canadian said, that idea is a bute, eh? Yeah. Hmm. But sadly, William Willett

would never see his incredible dream of extra sunlight. The following year on March 4th, 1915, he died at the age of 58. Fun little titty-bitty

about him, William Willett's great-great-grandson is Chris Martin, the lead singer of cold play. Oh, wow. Weird.

You think he wrote the song, Clocks for his great-great-grandfather? He should have. With the passing of William Willett, most people assumed that the dream of daylight savings time was over.

But then, an event happened that changed the world. The Great War, a.k.a. The war to end all wars, aka World War I. If you were to ask Christo, about this war, she would probably tell you she doesn't give a shit about it.

Or finds it boring. Oh. Interesting take. As for me, I think it was a very important historical event. Oh, okay. That shaped... That shaped many things in the 20th century, including daylight savings time. With war raging across Europe, there is now a concern for energy conservation.

You know, armies needed... coal for fuel. But coal was also the main source of fuel to power people's homes. So governments looked to find ways to cut energy usage, and that's how daylight savings re-emerged into the public arena. But shockingly, Prime Minister Herbert Asquith still refused to consider it. He was like, there's better ways to conserve energy than daylight savings. But then something really interesting happened, Kristen, on April 16, 1916. Germany declared, that they were instituting Somersight, aka Summertime. They were like, sunlight, yeah, dasiest good.

Somersight would go into effect on April 30th at 11 p.m. and end on October 1st at 1 a.m. And that made Germany the very first country to institute daylight savings time. A German newspaper bragged about the change, saying, quote, it is characteristic of England that she could not rouse herself to a decision. No.

Damn. And British folks were pissed. They were like, What the fuck? They were yelling, how dare you? That's a British idea. We thought of it first. And almost right away, a new daylight savings bill was introduced into parliament.

This is so stupid. One member hoped it would pass because it would be regrettable if, quote, a measure born in this country should profit. only our enemies. And what do you know this time around, Prime Minister Herbert Asquith was in favor of the bill. He now considered it a wartime necessity. And he was kind of right. The United Kingdom really did need to conserve energy because many coal miners had actually enlisted to fight in the army. Okay. So not only was a lot of coal going to the war effort, but also the ability to mine the coal. So daylight savings could actually help that problem. The government also thought daylight savings

would boost morale around the country. They were like, healthfulness and cheerfulness have their value in maintaining the morale of the nation. And so, on May 17, 1916, eight years after the idea was first introduced, the Summertime Act of 1916 passed Parliament. Many people refer to daylight savings time as Willett time in honor of William Willett.

Are you okay over there? You're a little quiet. This is just so dumb to me. Honestly, like, well, no, no, no, like the concept of this was an idea we kicked around, ultimately decided not to do. But then some cool girl does it and all of a sudden, hey, hey, that was our idea. Now we want it. Mm-hmm. Your enemy's doing it now.

You got to do it too. You got to keep up with them. It's like if I bought you a fresh pair of roller blades, you were. We're like, these are stupid. I'm not into roller blades. But then zoom, zoom, zoom. Make my heart go boom, boom. Go some dude roller blading by the house, blazing by.

And all of a sudden, you say to me, where are those roller blades? And I say, I don't know. I gave them him away to some hot guy with a lot of chill in his hair. Wow. Then you track that guy down or you try to. You're not fast enough because he's on the blades. He's had the blades longer than.

So then you have to go out and buy all new blades. This is exactly what's happening here. Man, you're right. Uh-huh. Great analogy, Kristen. Thank you. So four days after they passed that bill, on Sunday, May 21st, 1916, British folks were ordered to set their clocks forward. It was a historical moment, Kristen.

Children begged their parents. Let us stay up late. We want to watch Dad move the clock forward. I don't think they did. They did. Really? This was the first. time in history, people were doing this.

Okay, okay. It was like they're traveling through time. You don't think it's a big deal because we've been doing daylight savings time our whole life. Okay, yeah. These people, this is the first time. Yeah, it sounds. Check your privilege, Kristen. Okay.

Many clocks in public squares made the change a day before just to be safe. And that kind of caused some problems because people are like, it's later than I thought I got to get to the bar and get a beer. Well, on Sunday, May 21st, 1916 at 2 a.m., it happened. The clocks moved forward. Did planes crash? Did trains collide? Were a set of twins born at exactly 2 a.m. causing mass hysteria?

Nope. It was pretty smooth sailing overall. Wait, was this like the original Y2K bug? Did they think everything was going to exclude? Oh, absolutely. Hell yeah. What that shit was going to go horribly wrong. Okay.

Some night shift workers lost an hour of pay. So that kind of sucked. Some people forgot to change your clock and they overslept, making them late for work, but that's really about it. A lot of guitar practices were missed that day. Oh, man. How am I ever going to perform Freebird at my sister's wedding? That summer, people around the United Kingdom seemed to really enjoy the extra sunlight. Power consumption was down 20%. The police reported less juvenile crime.

There were less street accidents with cars and carriages. Now, farmers still hated daylight safety. But with a war going on, they unselfishly understood that daylight savings time was probably a good thing and it benefited the entire country. In September of 1916, Parliament decided that daylight savings time was here to stay, at least until the war was over. Then they would reassess. Soon, Great Britain's allies instituted daylight savings time as well. It made its way into Norway, Italy, Portugal, France. And then there was the United States.

USA, USA. Oh, oh, ooh. Would they follow the leader and institute daylight savings time as well? As the Brits would say, not bloody likely. Why? Because quite frankly, Kristen, the United States didn't really give a shit. On the next episode, have an old-timey podcast. Oh.

Daylight savings time becomes a contentious issue in America. Because our farmers loved it. No. hated it even more. Oh, okay. And they had farmers unions back then, and they banded together, and they were very influential in politics. Spoilers. Oh, wow. So what do you think, Kristen? Is it the worst topic I've ever done? Absolutely. I hated that I felt good about hating it. Then I started to like it, which I didn't like that change of opinion. And now I'm back to, feeling weird about it. It's just, it's a strange thing, Norman. You know, some people have pitched

making daylight savings time, like the permanent time. Like, we always observe it. Yeah, I mean, I would kind of like to just pick one thing and go with the one thing. Is that so bad? No, no, absolutely not. Do you have strong opinions on this? I really do enjoy daylight savings time. Uh-huh. I enjoy having that extra sun in the evening. I do too. That's my big thing. Yeah.

So as long as I get that, I'm happy because I have, what's it called, seasonal, effective disorder, sad. Yeah. I have sad. Yeah, I have sad. And, like, when the sun's not out, like, it affects my mood greatly. Absolutely. So, like, I'm a big fan. I'm a sun slut.

I'm all about it. Yeah. If your butthole doesn't get that 20 minutes of sun in the morning, you're just not the same guy. I'm not, not at all. You know what I think is really cute is when you put that, like a little sticker and a little shape on there so that you get. I do little fun designs on my butthole. Playboy Bunny. A star.

Yeah. Mm-hmm. I've done some sponsored work, too. Did Applebee's. They paid me like 75 bucks. I just had to post it on my own. Instagram. Yeah, all you had to do was have a two for 20 sticker on your butthole.

And you were happy to do it. It did cause confusion later in the day, but, you know, that's not Appleby's fault. They wanted me to put a now serving sticker with arrows pointing towards the butthole. And I was like, that's too much. Too far. I'm going to need 150 bucks for that. Yeah. Yeah.

Mm-hmm. You said, and I will take it in-store credit. I would, actually. I know you would. Okay. So I usually don't say how long a series will be, but this will be a two-parter, I promise. Okay. I know this isn't the most exciting.

I found it very interesting. You should have said that at the beginning if you knew it was going to be a two-parter. Well, I wanted to see your reaction first, and then I decided. It's going to be two parts. Wait, so you have looked at my reaction. You've decided she can't handle three? Yes, exactly. Like if Kristen can handle, the history hose can't handle it.

You saw my face as you did the math. Well, I got to say my original version of the script, talked about longitude lines and prime meridians a lot more. And I was just like, I don't know if Kristen can handle this. I don't know if the history hose can follow along. So I cut it on this stuff. Kristen can't handle it. And I'm glad you know your wife.

We should get you a bumper sticker. I love my wife. Ooh, good callback, Kristen. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Well, should we wrap things up or you got something for me? Oh, you know what? I do have a mistake of shame. What?

Well, it's kind of a gross one, but you know, I've said a lot of gross things this episode. Last week. Yeah. I covered 10-cent beer night, Cleveland Indians game. It was a sports story. I was slightly out of my element. And at one point, I shared a quote from a Cleveland radio guy. Yeah.

He said, let's all get out there and stick it in Billy Martin's ear. Right. Referring to the coach of the Rangers. Uh-huh. I was horrified by that. Sounded terrible. Maybe sexual. We don't know.

Yeah, we weren't sure what that meant. I thought it was just yell at him. My father texted both of us today. Let me grab my phone. And he said, the following. Stick it in his ear means hit him in the head with a pitch. Ouch. Old-timey.

Oh, Jesus. Oh, Jesus. I'm sorry for that noise. Jum scare. Yeah, old-timey baseball phrase, I guess. I'd never heard that. Yeah. So that has been mistakes of shame.

Shame. I regret the error. Although it is good to know that it was at least a baseball term. Kind of. Yeah, I'm glad it wasn't everyone stick your penis and Billy Martin's. I had not ruled that out. I'll be real honest with you. I got to say, I think people really enjoyed the story of the lady on top of the dugout, flashing her big old honking hooters. We all did. We all love a story like that. What's not to love?

Maybe it'll appear in this daylight savings time episode. How could it? What? More sunlight in the evening. People are excited. They're flashing their big old honking hooters. It could happen. You never know. Well, with that, should we wrap it up? Let's wrap it up, baby. Norm, you know what they say about history, hoes? We always cite our sources. That's right. For this episode, I got my information from,

Seize the Daylight, the Curious and Contentious Story of Daylight Savings Time by David Perrault. And a variety of different websites. Check the show notes for more information. That's all for this episode. Thank you for listening to an old-timey podcast. Please give us a five-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. And while you're at it, subscribe. Support us on Patreon at Patreon.

dot com slash old-timey podcast. Join the Reddit community, R slash old-timey podcast. Follow us on Facebook and YouTube and Instagram at old-timey podcast. You can also follow us individually on Instagram. She is the beautiful

Kristen Pitts-Karuso. I go by Gaming Historian, and until next time, Tudaloo, Tata, and cheerio.