Daylight saving time is coming to a close, meaning we’ll get to turn back the clocks an hour and catch up on sleep.
This year’s time change happens on Sunday, Nov. 7 at 2 a.m. Most people change their clocks before going to bed on Saturday night.
The pro is that there are more zzz’s to be had. The con is that now it will get darker earlier in the day. Daylight will shorten each day until the winter solstice on Dec. 21.
Daylight saving time begins again March 13, 2022, when clocks “spring forward” again.
The Department of Transportation oversees daylight saving time, a federal mandate under the Uniform Time Act of 1966. The agency cites many reasons for daylight saving time, including energy reduction and reduced crime.
Not every state follows daylight saving time, however. Hawaii and most of Arizona opt out.
Indiana did not observe DST until 2006. Because the state had two time zones, some of its counties changed their clocks in the fall and in the spring and some didn’t; because time zones were difficult to keep track of, a bill was passed in 2005 to unify the practice throughout the state. But the law was controversial, and it made the governor at the time, Mitch Daniels, unpopular.
Often erroneously called daylight savings time, the tradition evolves from both unusual and practical sources. There exists a common misconception that Benjamin Franklin is to credit, or blame, for the back-and-forth time shifts. However, according to The Franklin Institute website, despite Franklin’s prolific inventions, daylight saving time was not one of them.
“Daylight saving time is one thing that Franklin did not invent. He merely suggested Parisians change their sleep schedules to save money on candles and lamp oil.”
The initial concept of daylight saving time actually emerged in 1895 by George Hudson, an entomologist from New Zealand. Though the mechanics of his two-hour time shift in the summer differs from the current model in use in the United States, Hudson sought extra daylight hours after work for bug hunting, according to an article by National Geographic published online in 2019.
Daylight saving time during World Wars I and II were used by Allies and foes alike to conserve fuel for the war effort. Afterward, the practice in the U.S. remained inconsistent but popular enough with people that President Lyndon Johnson signed the Uniform Time Act of 1966 (15 U.S. Code Section 260a) into law on April 22, 1966, thus creating what we now observe.
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