'Fast Time,' Which Is Helping Us Win the War, Ends Oct. 27, 1918

Daylight Savings Time in the United States began on Sunday, March 13 and will end on Sunday, Nov. 6, 2016. Daylight savings time was used in other countries before “fast time,” as it was called, went into effect during World War I. Making better use of daylight and conserving energy was considered patriotic. It was discontinued, except in Pittsburg, Boston and New York City, until President Franklin D. Roosevelt reinstituted “War Time,” which was in effect from Feb. 9, 1942, to Sept. 30, 1945. There were no uniform rules for daylight standard time in the United States from 1942 until 1966, when Congress established a Uniform Time Act with DST beginning the last Sunday of April and ending the last Sunday of October. Congress also extended DST to 10 months during the oil embargo in 1974 and 1975, which saved the energy equivalent of 10,000 barrels of oil each day, but people complained about it and the schedule has been revised a number of times. The current schedule—the second Sunday in March to the first Sunday in November—was introduced in 2007. For more information on Daylight Savings Time, see https://www.timeanddate.com/time/dst/history.html.