In a comment to a prior post, Jim B. said, “Almost everything we do is governed by the clock.” That’s something we take for granted nowadays, but worth thinking about.
In pertinent part, Jim said:
Perhaps the most under appreciated innovation of 19th century America was the time zone system. Originally used by the railroads for their scheduling purposes it soon became accepted world-wide. Almost everthing we do today is governed by the clock. Modern society would be impossible without a uniformed time system. The Super Bowl kick-off at 6:25 EST is a case in point.
The concept is very simple. 24 hours in a day and 24 time zones around the globe. The zone system was a compromise between practicality and sun time by which each location set their clocks to noon or 12 o’clock when the sun was at its highest. In theory everywhere inside a zone is no more than 30 minutes from sun time.
This reminds me of a part of a class I took under the very excellent IU Communications Professor, Harmeet Sawhney. We were discussing Lewis Mumford and his discussion of how profound an impact the clock had on society. A handy passage from another work:
The clock “dissociated time from human events and helped create the belief in an independent world of mathematically measurable sequences ” As Mumford goes on to explain:
When one thinks of the day as an abstract space of time, one does not go to bed with the chickens on a winter’s night: one invents wicks, chimneys, lamps, gaslights, electric lamps, so as to use all the hours belonging to the day. When one thinks of time, not as a sequence of experiences, but as a collection of hours, minutes, and seconds, the habits of adding time and saving time come into existence. Time took on the character of an enclosed space: it could be divided, it could be filled up, it could even be expanded by the invention of labor-saving instruments. Abstract time became the new medium of existence.
There is a fair amount of irony to the history of the clock. Apparently it was invented, or at least improved quite a bit by Benedictine monks who wanted a device that would help them more accurately keep their prayers. But, in the end, it created a less organic and more mechanical world view. It was hugely important to the advance of science, since the ability to measure time is critical to many types of empirical observation. The scientific world view, in turn, has greatly damaged the primacy of religious devotion in our society.
Back on the subject of time zones and Daylight Saving Time, when we further disassociate our activities and notions of time from the course of the sun — e.g. ignoring the position of the sun when designating “noon,” we continue the process of divorcing ourselves from being organic parts of the world.
With the invention of efficient electrical lighting systems for the home and the streets it is much easier to disassociate ourselves from the sun, and true noon, especially in urban areas. We can even have midnight basketball,and people work all sorts of hours.One more point…so much of the debate in Indiana is about who the villains are in TZ war,and how contrived the process has been. That may be true, but the true wishes of people may not be considered as a result and may be hidden under emotional reactions.May that be one reason for the re=petitions? That’s why the time issue may continue for some time.
I am floored and delighted that you quote Mumford on this topic. He didn’t specialize in a “sexy” period of American history and so is usually ignored, but IMHO there’s a lot to be said for the folks who work with the “meat and potatoes” bits of history.
I agree with your point about the Benedictines, though I am also grateful that they attempted to impose order upon a disorganized world. They are bot to blame for the Indiana time Zone mess. Would that they could have done something about internal clocks and insomnia. As Lou notes, we are now a 24 hour society, and not all of that voluntarily or even wisely.
Glad I could provoke such a reaction. I am an equal opportunity scavenger of ideas. I’ll cheerfully lift things from Mumford or Jeremy Bentham, but at the same time, I’ll crib from box office super hero cliches. Really, I have no pride when it comes to appropriating ideas. (Though I do try to accurately quote my sources.)
Doug– I am truly bound by the clock– as a High School teacher I find my life neatly divided by a 55 minute bell and five minute passing time. In essence… I must be able to accomplish herculean tasks during the 5 minutes– and I must always move on– regardless of my need to stop and think. Beyond that, my days and weeks.. and months are regulated as well.. to the point that I am at a loss in the summer or on Vacation. I even lose track of the days.
Oh, jeeze, the bell. That thing got so ingrained in me that I recall working a school building one summer – they still had the bells hooked up. Even though it wasn’t time for me to go anywhere, every time the bell rang, I “felt” myself getting up, even though I didn’t actually move. It was like the bell activated some lower part of my brain that was trying to fire the signal to get the muscles to go, but a moment later a higher part of my brain over-rode it.
For anyone interested the Ice Miller response to the request by the DOT for additional information November 14th is posted on the DOT docket.I just glanced over it (23 pages) but these guys never stop amazing me they couldn’t even get by the first page without yet another incorrect statement!
In RESPONSE 1B They state the Dubois county(Jasper) Wal Mart is not open 24hrs a day.WRONG AGAIN!The rest of the petition at first glance is more misleading information and now since the first petition was exposed they seem to be saying anything that they mislead about or supports Central time is of little impotance or impact and people can simply adjust.
They are the ones who made the big deal out of the Wal Mart stores in the first place.I am sure over the coming days Central time supporters will disect this information and find more lies and misleading statements contained in it.
I do not know what this firm is being paid but whatever it is it’s too much.Frankly they’d be better off hiring Rocky Byrd or Tim Joyce they do a much better job!
I guess if the Joint Petition is granted though as local lawmakers say it will be that will be all that matters regardless whether they tell the truth,mislead or anything else for that matter.
Phillip,
There are a great deal of other new postings on the USDOT docket 22114.Hopefully, those who have computers that can download 17 or 20 pages will keep us informed as to whether there is something new of value there.
I checked out the USDOT docket 22114 again and it seems that there is just about three central time trolls throwing a hissy fit! They really should limit posts to the docket as one per citizen.
Richard,
If the time issue were a court case it would be The Chamber of Commerce vs Hoosiers for CT. But ‘convenience of commerce’ is what USDOT wants to gather info about,and theyre the judge . Im so glad I studied existentialism at least a little.
I agree with Richard. We should limit freedom of speech for those that disagree with me.
Lou If it was a court case, the Chamber would be convicted of perjury because they shape the “facts” to suit their purposes.
Convenience of Commerce should be given due consideration but should not be the only criteria for setting a boundary. There is a built-in conflict between boundaries and commerce. The straighter boundary lines are the better because they are less confusing that way. Commerce is not unidirectional but tends to radiate from a center to form a circle or a commercial sphere. Attempting to fit a straight line to a circle is a daunting task even for the experts at DOT. Keeping the boundary as straight as possible should take preference because commerce is always changing and can adjust to boundaries if it knows where they are. As I pointed out in an earlier post the border between Ohio/Indiana is a very straight line. We central people should be able to rest our case but we can’t because the eastern zealots will not let the case be decided by the facts.
If people call some of we Central time supporters trolls so be it.The fact is that 3 citizens of Southwest Indiana from Dubois,Knox and Martin counties not counting myself took time out to write rebuttal petitions that challenged the Joint Petition prepared by Ice Miller.
The result of this work was the November 14th correspondence to Ice Miller from Senior Counsel Kaleta asking for explanations about misleading statements and incorrect statements.
If Richard will look through this docket he will see a lot of support for Central time not just from repeat submitters.Support comes from a few businesses,a doctor,Dubois county bus drivers ect.
We are not content to sit by and let these statements by Ice Miller go unchallenged because many were incorrect.Now maybe I’ve made a big deal out of this whole time zone mess but since I live in one of the affected counties,have been involved with this from the start and believe in Central time I will continue to speakout.Now in the end according to local lawmakers we will probably lose but you’ll never convince me it has to do with convenience of commerce.In reality strong cases can be made for both time zones.
What still amazes me is that this big law firm after their incorrect statements in the first go around couldn’t even make it past the first page of this new correspondence to the DOT without yet another incorrect statement.Believe me when I say there will be more to come I found another one right off the bat just glancing through the thing.I do not mind this law firm representing the counties by using clever statements and charts but I’m tired of the lies and that’s what they are.I do not know if it is intentional or they think we do not know how to read or what but if you asked me this firm has done a poor job.If they get the desired result though I guess that’s all that matters.
When your one of the people who live in this area and you or your family will be effected in a bad way by Governor Daniels time zone wall you sure as hell can expect people from both sides to be upset!
Hey Richard,
Enjoy you’re extra golf time and do me a favor. Just Shut Up! As long as we are bound by this illegitimate ,incorrect ,lobbyists -paid for time zone that the majority of the people(remember democracy?) were opposed to, we ,the people, will not be silent. So go suck a golf ball, goof ball!
Of all the reasons these 5 counties should change back to ET the one that always seems to be first is that for years these counties were always the same time as the rest of the state and the capital. Now they are always an hour behind,and the ties with Evansville area don’t compensate for the break with the rest of state.This is mho.
How can we sum up the CT argument in one easy sentence?
Better than that Lou I can sum up the Chamber’s arguments with 2 words. Snake oil.
If these 5 counties are moved it wouldn’t be to the same time they have been on for the past 37 years. They had been on EST all year which for Indiana is the same as being on CDT all year. It isn’t like being moved back to ET it would be to double daylight time. I don’t know why anyone would want post 8 am sunrises 5 months of the year.
I failed to point out in post #10 that these commercial spheres overlap with many other spheres radiating from their centers. The Evansville sphere and the Indianapolis sphere do overlap in the 5 counties in question. DOT will have to split some very fine hair to decide where the convenience of commerce is best served. The resulting boundary would look like something designed by a committee from a pretzel bakery.
Lou,
The ONLY point I have always conceeded to Eastern time supporters is the one you make above and that is that now that the majority of the state is one hour ahead of this region it can be inconvenient for some.
Ever since man learned to manage fire he has tried to use it to defeat the darkness. But no matter how much artificial lighting we use the darkness still remains. We have tried to gain more light by moving our clocks ahead and call it saving the light but the ratio of light to dark remains constant.
We can’t escape the fact that we are creatures of the sun. Tom Heller said, ” The clock rules my life but the sun controls my body”. And he was right. Our daily activities such as work and school are governed by the clock but our bodies are governed by the position of the sun.
I think the people who devised the zone system understood the importance of the sun and its relationship to organic man and reached a compromise between sun time and the need to schedule and coordinate our activities with others across greater distances. Perhaps the rooster’s crow was more healthy than our modern day alarm clocks.
I preferred doing without the daylight savings time shuffle – I figured that staying on Eastern Standard Time all year round was the best compromise we were likely to get. (Looking at a globe, though, Central time has much to commend it.)
Still, maybe that ‘extra hour of daylight’ will make the crops grow better…or at least let the corn fields play golf, or spend more time with their families, or something.
International Airlines couldn’t cope with an immediate time zone shift so they were given another year to co-ordinate schedules and there other issues,too. We can always enjoy the sun when it is overhead without looking at our watches and the crops will grow and the animals will eat when it’s light or when they’re fed and no one needs a watch. But when we ‘go somewhere’ that’s when we need a watch. And farmers adjusted too. I worked on a farm summers when I was a high schooler and the new DST gave us the opportunity to go and work in the fields for another hour or so after supper.And we had electricity in the barns in the morning.
I worked constuction in the Summer while attending college and everyone I worked with liked the early sunrises we had here on year round Eastern Standard time which as you know put us in line with the Central time zone.Since in the late Spring and Summer sunsets and darkness are coming late anyway on Central time there is ample time to work after the dinner hour.Eastern DST or as some like to call it double daylight time is a bit of the extreme with 10:00pm darkness in the Summer.
Lou,
My meaning was the early sunrises from April to end of October we had on year round Eastern Standard time which corresponds with most outside work but certainly not all outside work.
Jim B,
In USA there were the commercial TZs the railroads developed along their routes which gradually spread out and there were simultaneously published the official TZ maps dividing the world into 15 degree-wide strips. On the official 1893 TZ map the ET/CT line was drawn precisely through Mansfield OH and continued South to about Tampa FL. The railroad TZ map of 1887 has all of OH,GA KY,TN and FL in CTZ. So I’d say that the ‘working time zone’ was always a commercial development,initially by railroads wanting to make a uniform train schedule.Here are two links where we see each of these maps.
http://store.pastpresent corp.com/crams18anmap54.html
http://store.pastpresentcorp.com/co18anmapofu.html
Lou Thanks for the links. I wasn’t able to open the first link but your description sounds very much like the 1883 railroad zones which had Oh, Ga, Ky, Tn, and Fl in the central zone.
The second link shows a perfectly symmetrical time zone arrangement that has never been observed. The Mansfield line is at 82.5 deg longitude or midway between the 75 deg eastern meridian and the 90 deg. central meridian. DOT has the authority to adjust the boundary line between the zones.
Please notice that Indiana is the only state that the boundary has been moved across its border thereby dividing a previously unified state into 2 zones. This is why I feel so strongly that we Hoosiers have not been treated fairly because it was done without our consent.
I have been working on an article that describes the evolution of the zones from the railroad arrangement to the 1961 boundary.
I am going to post it as a comment on Doug’s Pulaski County thread. Thanks again for the links. I found the maps on this site very interesting.