How did daylight standard time come about?

Answer 1

I could type a brief description of what happened but stealing from wikipedia is so much easier.

Saving daylight was first mentioned in 1784 by Benjamin Franklin in a humorous letter[5] urging Parisians to save money by getting up earlier to use morning sunlight, thereby burning fewer candles in the evening. Franklin did not mention daylight saving time—he did not propose that clock time be changed. His letter was in the spirit of his earlier proverb "Early to bed and early to rise / Makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise."[6]


The William Willett Memorial Sundial is always on DST.In 1905 builder and outdoorsman William Willett invented DST in one of his pre-breakfast horseback rides. Willett had been dismayed by how many Londoners slept through the best part of a summer day. An avid golfer, he also disliked cutting short his round at dusk. Two years later he published a comprehensive proposal for DST which attracted many eminent supporters, including Balfour, Churchill, Lloyd George, and MacDonald. Edward VII also favored DST and had already been using it at Sandringham. However, Prime Minister Asquith opposed the proposal and after many hearings it was narrowly defeated in a Parliament committee vote in 1909. Willett's allies introduced new DST bills every year from 1911 through 1914, to no avail.

World War I changed the political equation. DST was first enacted by a national government by Germany starting April 30, 1916. The United Kingdom soon followed suit, first observing it on May 21, 1916. On June 17, 1917, Newfoundland became the first North American jurisdiction to adopt DST with the Daylight Saving Act of 1917. On March 19, 1918, the U.S. Congress established DST from the last Sunday in March to the last Sunday in October. The wartime measure, however, proved unpopular among farmers, and Congress repealed it in 1919. Woodrow Wilson, another avid golfer, vetoed the repeal twice but his second veto was overridden. The history of time in the United States since then has seen several enactments or adjustments of DST, and one repeal, with similar politics involved

Answer 2

History of Daylight Time in the U.S.
Although standard time in time zones was instituted in the U.S. and Canada by the railroads in 1883, it was not established in U.S. law until the Act of March 19, 1918, sometimes called the Standard Time Act. The act also established daylight saving time, a contentious idea then. Daylight saving time was repealed in 1919, but standard time in time zones remained in law. Daylight time became a local matter. It was re-established nationally early in World War II, and was continuously observed from 9 February 1942 to 20 September 1945. After the war its use varied among states and localities. The Uniform Time Act of 1966 provided standardization in the dates of beginning and end of daylight time in the U.S. but allowed for local exemptions from its observance. The act provided that daylight time begin on the last Sunday in April and end on the last Sunday in October, with the changeover to occur at 2 a.m. local time.

During the "energy crisis" years, Congress enacted earlier starting dates for daylight time. In 1974, daylight time began on 6 January and in 1975 it began on 23 February. After those two years the starting date reverted back to the last Sunday in April. In 1986, a law was passed that shifted the starting date of daylight time to the first Sunday in April, beginning in 1987. The ending date of daylight time was not subject to such changes, and remained the last Sunday in October. The Energy Policy Act of 2005 changed both the starting and ending dates. Beginning in 2007, daylight time starts on the second Sunday in March and ends on the first Sunday in November.

http://aa.usno.navy.mil/faq/docs/daylight_time.html