Don't forget to adjust your clocks this weekend! Here's exactly when Daylight Saving Time returns
If you’re tired of it getting dark at 5 pm, you may be wondering when Daylight Saving Time will come into effect in Canada this year. Don’t worry — the time to turn the clocks is very close now.
Daylight Saving Time (DST) will have us officially springing forward by one hour on Sunday, March 10, at 2 am local time.
The clocks will change again as we “fall back” by one hour on Sunday, November 3.
Although springing forward means you’re losing an hour of sleep, Daylight Saving brings a welcome change to those dark winter days because there will be more light during the evening.
How did Daylight Saving Time start?
The origins of DST are credited to a few people.
The first is George Vernon Hudson, a British-born New Zealander, who proposed the idea of Daylight Saving Time in 1895.
As an entomologist, Hudson treasured his daylight hours after work, which he used to collect insects. This led to the idea of changing the clocks to allow for more daylight in the summer, which he presented in a paper to the Wellington Philosophical Society in 1895. He even got a medal for it – the TK Sidey Medal.
It’s reported that Benjamin Franklin also proposed saving daylight in 1784 when he advocated ringing church bells and firing cannons at dawn to save money on candles and lamp oil.
The Farmers’ Almanac notes that the true founder of DST was an Englishman named William Willet, who came up with the idea while riding his horse one morning in 1907. In his “The Waste of Daylight” manifesto, he wrote: “Everyone appreciates the long, light evenings. Everyone laments their shrinkage as the days grow shorter, and nearly everyone has given utterance to a regret that the nearly clear, bright light of an early morning during spring and summer months is so seldom seen or used…”
Thunder Bay was the first Canadian city to adopt the practice of Daylight Saving in 1908.
DST caught on worldwide due to a global energy crisis during the 1970s.
Daylight Saving isn’t a universal practice
Some places in the world, such as Argentina, Chile, Iceland, Singapore, Uzbekistan, and Belarus, have all permanently set their clocks forward to get more daylight out of each day to save on energy.
Many folks disagree with the concept of Daylight Saving Time altogether, believing that the detriments outweigh the benefits.
In the US, California, Oregon, Washington, and Idaho formed a working group proposing legislation to make Pacific Standard Time permanent in those states.
In Canada, British Columbians were promised a switch to permanent DST by former premier John Horgan, but those plans have been slow to progress.
The Yukon pushed to make DST permanent in 2020.
Are you in favour of Daylight Saving Time? Let us know in the comments.
With files from Zoe Demarco