Chapter 46
Section 46 of 1000 Things Worth Knowing. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Amelia Chesley. 1000 Things Worth Knowing by Nathaniel C. Fowler Jr. Standard Time. Until 1883, each city or district maintained its own time, usually accepting what is known as true time. This condition caused complications. For example, many railroad station clocks either gave two times or else there were separate clocks for each time, some of the trains leaving the station on what was known as New York time, while others left on local time. Banks and business houses closed on either of the times. There was no standard and no agreement. In 1883, standard time was established. The first section was known as the Eastern, uncovered all territory between the Atlantic Coast and a line drawn from Detroit, Michigan to Charleston, South Carolina. The central section included everything between the Detroit, Charleston line and a line drawn from Bismarck, North Dakota to the mouth of the Rio Grande River.
The third section, known as Mountain Time, included the territory between the Bismarck-Rio Grande line and the western borders of Idaho, Utah, and Arizona. The Pacific Time section embraced everything west of the Mountain Time line up to and including the Pacific Coast. There is a difference of just one hour between the sections. When it is 12 o'clock at Boston, Massachusetts, or at New York City, it is 11 o'clock at Chicago and at San Francisco, 9 o'clock. The changing from so-called local or true time to standard time required clocks at Boston to be set back 16 minutes. New York clocks to be set back 4 minutes, Detroit clocks to be set back 28 minutes, St. Louis clocks to be moved ahead 1 minute, and San Francisco clocks to be set ahead 10 minutes.
Standard time has been accepted by every state and by practically every city, although a very few cities and towns unprogressively hold to the former or true time. The Canadian Pacific Railroad, which has the longest mileage of any railroad in the world, is run on what is known as the 24-hour time. That is, the faces of its clocks, instead of bearing the figures 1 to 12, run from 1 to 24 inclusive. The timetables are rather confusing as trains are built to arrive and depart at 1310, 1614, 2330, etc. This system appears to have only one advantage, that it eliminates the use of AM and PM.
It is possible that it will be accepted elsewhere, and even generally, but not for the present. A tribunal made up of a committee of the King's Privy Council instituted or revived in 1486. It was supposed to have almost unlimited powers and to be exempt from any rules or law. It had the right to inflict any form of punishment, except death. The term is now applied to assemblies or committees or others who conduct their investigations and decide upon questions in secret.
The number of visible stars is as follows. 19 stars of the first magnitude, 59 stars of the second magnitude, 182 stars of the third magnitude, 530 stars of the fourth magnitude, 1600 stars of the fifth magnitude, 4800 stars of the sixth magnitude, 13,000 stars of the seventh magnitude, 40000 of the eighth magnitude, 100,000 of the ninth magnitude,
400,000 of the 10th magnitude, 1.000,000 of the 11th magnitude, 3.000.000 stars of the 12th magnitude, and 10.000.000 stars of the 13th magnitude, 30.000.000 stars of the 14th magnitude, 30 million stars of the 14th magnitude,
and 56 million stars of the 15th magnitude, for a total of 100,560,190 stars. End of section 46.
