The federal government enacted nationwide Daylight Saving Time amid the darkest depths of wartime fears on this day in history, Feb. 9, 1942.
“Passed by Congress and signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, the year-round daylight saving time required that clocks be moved ahead one hour for the remainder of the war as a national defense measure to conserve energy,” notes Fishwrap, a blog of historic newspaper headlines.
The federal action went into effect just two months after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor plunged the United States into World War II.
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The U.S. and its Allies struggled to contain Japanese advances in early 1942 and victory appeared hopeless.
The U.S. Army at the time was being overrun on the Bataan Peninsula in the Philippines, while British Commonwealth forces were on the verge of losing Singapore.
In this Dec. 7, 1941 file photo, smoke rises from battleship USS Arizona as it sinks during Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Congress and President Roosevelt enacted daylight saving time amid fears after the surprise attack. (AP Photo, File)
The British defeat on Feb. 15 proved the largest surrender in U.K. military history.
America’s surrender in April was followed by the brutal Bataan Death March.
The change in clock management was seen amid defeat and fear as a way “to promote the national security and defense by establishing daylight saving time,” according to the language in the statute — “which is why it was nicknamed ‘war time,’” the U.S. Department of Defense reports.
American time zones were renamed Eastern War Time, Pacific War Time, etc., across all five time zones in the United States and its territories at the time.
Theodore Van Kirk, the flight navigator aboard the Enola Gay, held up the navigator’s master clock he carried during the atomic bomb mission over Hiroshima. (Paul Chinn/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)
War Time remained in effect until after the surrender of Japan in September 1945.
Despite the war effort, the decision by the government was treated with the same controversy it suffers today in the minds of many Americans.
“Daylight savings time was passed to promote the national security and defense.” — Department of Defense.
“City yawns as new wartime goes into effect,” read the front page headline of one American newspaper.
The story noted that “many workers have new experience, going to job in dark.”
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Daylight Saving Time does not, of course, change the amount of daylight, as many people seem to believe.
It merely means the sun rises later and sets later, according to our manmade measure of time.
Credit, or blame, wartime tinkering for the confusion over time — starting in World War I.
“In America, daylight saving time first became official on March 19, 1918, when the Standard Time Act was signed into law,” writes the Defense Department.
A last-minute check of equipment is made before American paratroopers leave their English base for an airborne assault on Nazi defenses on the north coast of France, June 6, 1944. Thanks to British Double Summer Time during the war, it was still daylight when paratroopers boarded planes around 11 p.m. on June 5. (PhotoQuest/Getty Images)
“The part of that law pertaining to daylight saving time was only in effect for about a year and a half, though, before it was repealed due to the war’s end, despite President Woodrow Wilson vetoing the repeal.”
Great Britain was even more aggressive with its clock management during World War II. It moved clocks ahead two hours. It was called British Double Summer Time.
Among other consequences, it meant paratroopers who spearheaded the D-Day invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944, departed England in daylight around 11 p.m. on the night of June 5.
“Great Britain moved clocks ahead two hours during World War II. It was called British Double Summer Time.”
“The clocks were turned back to Greenwich Meantime at the end of summer 1945,” notes the website Historic.UK.
“However, because of severe fuel shortages resulting from the harsh winter of 1946/47, the UK returned to British Double Summer Time during the summer of 1947.”
President Franklin Roosevelt delivers his State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress on Jan. 6, 1941. It would be remembered as his “Four Freedoms” speech. (Library of Congress/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images)
Confusion over the clock followed the end of wartime – and War Time – in the United States.
“The law was once again repealed, so individual states could establish their own standard time, writes the Defense Department.
“For the next two decades, there were no set rules for daylight saving time, which caused a lot of confusion for the transportation and broadcast industries.”
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Congress passed the Uniform Time Act in 1966 that established daylight saving time across the country from the last Sunday in April to the last Sunday in October. It was amended in 2005 to extend from March to November.
Controversy and confusion continue to plague the practice of so-called daylight saving time on both sides of the Atlantic.
“The first time zones were established by United States railroads in 1883.”
“Since its introduction, Daylight Saving Time has had both its advocates and critics. Advocates for the system claim the lighter summer mornings save energy, reduce traffic accidents and get people out and about and more active,” notes Historic.UK.
“Critics, however, claim that if adopted all year round (known as British Standard Time), this would result in darker winter mornings, which would be more dangerous for children going to school.”
Union Pacific diesel locomotive train, Cajon Pass near Ono, California, 1964. Sprawling distances across North America and a confusing patchwork of local methods of timekeeping encouraged railroads to adopt time zones in 1883. (GHI/Universal History Archive via Getty Images)
American families may face the same conundrum in the future.
The Senate last year passed legislation that would have made daylight saving time permanent this year, but momentum for the bill died amid other world affairs.
The notion of time zones is a fairly recent concept in human history.
“While daylight saving time is a federal mandate, states can opt out of it by passing a state law. Hawaii and Arizona don’t observe it, though the Navajo Nation in northeastern Arizona does. Most American territories, including Puerto Rico and Guam, don’t observe it, either,” says the Department of Defense.
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The notion of time zones is a fairly recent concept in human history.
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The first time zones were established by United States railroads in 1883 in an effort to bring scheduling order to a chaotic system of timekeeping kept by local communities across the nation. Standardized times zones were soon adopted around the world.
Government officials around the world today now appear to feel empowered to bend time to their will.
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