Wondering when it is time to set your clocks back this year?
Daylight savings time ends at 2 a.m. Sunday, Nov. 2, 2025. Getting an extra hour of sleep is a perk of turning back the clocks one hour in the fall, but what started the practice?
The Uniform Time Act of 1966 () established a system of uniform daylight saving time throughout the United States and its possessions, and provides that either Congress or the Secretary of Transportation can change a time-zone boundary.
The act specifies that daylight time applies from 2 a.m. on the second Sunday of March until 2 a.m. on the first Sunday of November in areas that do not specifically exempt themselves.
The origin of daylight saving time has a definite link to commerce.
“In 1883, U.S. and Canadian railroads adopted a four-zone system to govern their operations and reduce the confusion resulting from some 100 conflicting locally established ‘sun times’ observed in terminals across the country,” the U.S. . “States and municipalities then adopted one of the four zones, which were the eastern, central, mountain, and Pacific Time zones.”
The observance of DST began during World War I in Europe.
“Federal oversight of time zones began in 1918 with the enactment of the Standard Time Act, which vested the Interstate Commerce Commission with the responsibility for establishing boundaries between the standard time zones in the continental United States,” the DOT website states.
This was the first time DST was observed in the U.S. and and it was quickly repealed on Aug. 20, 1919.
The that have or are considering legislation related to daylight saving time and many other states do so each year.
