DST ending at 2 a.m.

November 3, 2018 | 11:42 am

Updated November 4, 2018 | 3:51 am

One of the hardest traditions to explain to younger kids — and even for adults to wrap their brains around — is the semi-annual change to and from daylight saving time. And yes, it is daylight saving, not savings.

On Sunday morning, we may be happy to have an extra hour to lounge in bed, get up a little later for a jog by Smothers Park or get ready for the day, but on Monday, no one will be happy to wake for school and work. Our six-month rhythms will be off and it will be a tired start to the week.

Why do we change from daylight saving to standard time at 2 a.m. Nov. 4? Several stories give credit to Ben Franklin for the idea, but according to Michael Downing, author of “Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time,” the first Daylight Saving Time policy began in Germany in 1916 in the hopes that it would save energy during World War I. But, the idea may have come from British Man William Willett, who wanted to have an “extra” hour of sunlight after a day of work.

According to Time magazine, the first U.S. law on Daylight Saving Time went into effect on March 19, 1918, for the same fuel saving reasons, about a year after the country entered the war. For 40 years, U.S. citizens argued on whether it was a good idea or not. One of the greatest opponents were farmers (though another myth says they are who started the idea) who said they were unable to complete the morning tasks on the farm because they had less morning daylight time.

In 1966, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Uniform Time Act. which said the United States would observe six months of Daylight Saving Time and six months of Standard Time.

Many contemporary citizens want to eliminate daylight saving time, but the federal government controls the nation’s time zones as well as the start and end dates of daylight saving time, according to The New York Times.

So the sun will be setting when many are leaving work for about six weeks as we rotate toward the shortest day of the year — the Winter Solstice — Dec. 21.

Good luck to teachers whose students were unable to go to sleep at their “normal” bedtime, which is suddenly an hour earlier — and to the parents who must wake them an hour earlier on our forecasted rainy Monday. The lines at local coffee shops may be a bit longer as well.

November 3, 2018 | 11:42 am

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