You know the old saying, "spring ahead, fall back"...
 Set your clocks ahead 1 hour Sunday 2AM |
It's time to spring ahead!Daylight saving time 2012 officially begins this Sunday, March 11 at 2:00AM (local time) -- remember to set your clocks ahead one hour to 3:00AM when you go to bed Saturday night. |
It's also the perfect time to install a fresh battery in your smoke detectors.
About Daylight Saving Time
Daylight saving time (DST) — aka summer time is the practice of temporarily advancing clocks during the summertime so that afternoons have more daylight and mornings have less. Clocks are adjusted forward one hour near the start of spring and are adjusted backward in autumn.
Most of the United States and Canada observe DST beginning the second Sunday in March and ending the first Sunday in November -- almost two-thirds of the year.
(More on the history of Daylight Saving Time below the break)
Benjamin Franklin first suggested Daylight Saving Time in 1784, but modern DST was not proposed until 1895 when an entomologist from New Zealand, George Vernon Hudson, presented a proposal for a two-hour daylight saving shift to the Wellington Philosophical Society.
Daylight saving time was not formally adopted in the United States until the Standard Time Act of March 19, 1918. It established both standard time zones and set summer DST to begin on March 31, 1918. The idea was unpopular, however, and Congress abolished DST after World War I.
During World War II, President Franklin Roosevelt instituted year-round DST, called "War Time", on February 9, 1942. It lasted until the last Sunday in September 1945. The following year, many states and localities adopted summer DST which has been observed as we know it ever since.
