To the best of my knowledge, Indiana now has just three “time zones.” Northwest and Southwest Indiana are in the Central Time Zone, while the rest of the state is in the Eastern Time Zone. All of Indiana observes Daylight Saving Time.
But that’s not the way it used to be. Indiana had five separate “pods” of time zones from about 1967-77.
Most of Indiana was in the Eastern Time Zone, and did not observe Daylight Saving Time.
Some counties in northwest Indiana were in the Central Time Zone and observed DST
Likewise, some counties in southwest Indiana were in Central Time and observed DST
Four counties across the river from Louisville were on Eastern Time but DID observe DST.
Three counties near Cincinnati also were on Eastern time and DST
If you want to be really picky, one lonely county along the Ohio River between Louisville and Cincinnati was on Eastern Time but did NOT observe DST.
My wife just got back from a work trip to west Texas. Where she was staying was in the mountain time portion if the state. The only hotel in the town of 700 didn’t have alarm clocks in the room so she used her cell phone. Her cell phone was apparently latched on to a tower in the central time portion of the state and so the first day she showed up an hour early for work. After that she adjusted her alarms to be an hour later since there were no cell towers her phone could grab that would give her the right time.
Back in the 70s, I went to college just over the border from both Eastern Standard Time Indiana and Eastern Daylight Savings Time Indiana… AND we were just as close to Central Standard Time Indiana.
There was a practical feature here. We’d turn on an Indiana TV station in the student union, watch Star Trek … then change to a Indiana station closer to Chicago and watch it again! We could also get a Michigan station and at night, Chicago, too.
Luckily, I didn’t try to figure it all out, or I wouldn’t have had enough brain cells left to devote to my classes.
Before the development of rail travel in the UK in the 19th century, Every town had its own time zone. Of course, it didn’t matter much since only the wealthy had watches and few people ravelled far, and that only slowly.
“Railway Time”
With the introduction of the railway, travel became faster. With every station keeping its own local mean time, the need for a synchronized time arose.
The first railway company to implement a common time for all stations, appropriately named “Railway Time,” was the Great Western Railway in November 1840. By 1847, most railways were using “London Time,” the time set at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich.
In 1847, the Railway Clearing House, an industry standards body, recommended that Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) be adopted at all stations as soon as the General Post Office permitted it. On December 1, 1847, the London and North Western Railway, as well as the Caledonian Railway, adopted “London Time,” and by 1848 most railways had followed.
Being an Illinoisan, I never really thought ANY part of IN was all that close to St L.
In Chicago, IIRC on the NE corner of LaSalle and Jackson, there is a plaque on the old Continental Bank Building commemorating the adoption of standard time zones in the US, similarly, for railroad purposes.
You are correct, there is a chunk of Illinois in the way, but those counties in the “point” of Indiana are even further away from anything else. St. Louis is the nearest metro area, even if it’s not next door.
I live in the far eastern portion of the Eastern Time Zone, and sunset was at 4:12 today.
There’s a local radio host who says that we should be on Daylight Savings Time all year. I maintain that he is wrong, and that we should be on Atlantic Standard Time all year.
I’m having trouble remember the specifics. I think Cd. Juárez used to be Central but didn’t have DST. Whatever it was, there was some partial mismatch with El Paso that caused me confusion a few times. Now I believe they’re both Mountain (or its equivalent in Mexico) and observing DST but the dates are off by a week or so.
Having lived in Evansville, the commercial and population hub of the Tri-State area, I can say with certainty that Indianapolis, Louisville, and even Nashville are closer than St. Louis.
I live in the far eastern portion of Central time. Sunset was 4:20 pm yesterday. I don’t see an issue here…? It’s not like I turn into a pumpkin at sundown, nor do we have a problem with vampire attacks at evening rush hour…
Because western Kentucky and southern Illinois run on Central time.
Yeah, I know that’s about like saying, “Because I said so,” but if you consider southwest Indiana as a trade zone it makes more sense to run on the same time. Ditto with northwest Indiana and Chicago.
Re. sunset time, I remember being in Michigan and a friend calling her family in Maine in the evening. She commented that being at opposite ends of the time zone meant that sunset came an hour earlier in Maine even though the 2 places are at the same latitude. Sunset today in Portland Maine is at 4:04 PM and at 5:08 PM in Grand Rapids Michigan. Sunset in Rochester NY is at 4:33, at the same latitude but in the middle of the time zone.
