DST is one of those national urban legends, the legend being that Benjamin Franklin was so well respected that even his jokes got turned into law.
Which wasn't necessarily the case anyway, DST notwithstanding. By the time of the Constitutional Convention, most of Franklin's contemporaries felt the randy old bastard had long since outlived his usefulness, and thought the best thing he could do for them would be to retire from public - and, for that matter, private - life so that they could get on with revering him as a Heroic Historical Figure instead of having to put up with him in person.
Mind you, I say this as a big Franklin fan - he's by far my favorite of the Founding Fathers - but still, there it is.
As for DST itself, I understand the logic behind it, but I dislike it and feel that it's an unnecessary relic. If we really want more daylight on the tail end of the day in the summer, I think the real answer is to move all the time zones ahead an hour permanently, so that Eastern Standard Time becomes GMT -4 and so on. That would also alleviate the unfortunate problem of it getting dark at 3:30 p.m. here in the North Country in winter, which I would certainly appreciate. Sure, it wouldn't get light until almost 9 in the morning at that time of year, but so what? Morning people can go pound sand. They've been reaping the unfair advantage for 200 years, dammit, it's my turn now.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-04-03 10:54 am (UTC)Which wasn't necessarily the case anyway, DST notwithstanding. By the time of the Constitutional Convention, most of Franklin's contemporaries felt the randy old bastard had long since outlived his usefulness, and thought the best thing he could do for them would be to retire from public - and, for that matter, private - life so that they could get on with revering him as a Heroic Historical Figure instead of having to put up with him in person.
Mind you, I say this as a big Franklin fan - he's by far my favorite of the Founding Fathers - but still, there it is.
As for DST itself, I understand the logic behind it, but I dislike it and feel that it's an unnecessary relic. If we really want more daylight on the tail end of the day in the summer, I think the real answer is to move all the time zones ahead an hour permanently, so that Eastern Standard Time becomes GMT -4 and so on. That would also alleviate the unfortunate problem of it getting dark at 3:30 p.m. here in the North Country in winter, which I would certainly appreciate. Sure, it wouldn't get light until almost 9 in the morning at that time of year, but so what? Morning people can go pound sand. They've been reaping the unfair advantage for 200 years, dammit, it's my turn now.