AtDTDA (2): 30 Railroad Watch

[John BAILEY]

Also in Wolfgang Schivelbusch's outstanding "The Railway Journey", which
I'm pretty sure Dave Monroe has seconded here before as well. What a
great read. 

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-pynchon-l at waste.org [mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org] On
Behalf Of Robert Mahnke
Sent: Monday, 5 February 2007 3:02 PM
To: 'Pynchlist'
Subject: RE: AtDTDA (2): 30 Railroad Watch


As I recall, this history is a topic of discussion in Rebecca Solnit's
River Of Shadows, which I believe I previously recommended on this list.

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-pynchon-l at waste.org [mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org] On
Behalf Of Dave Monroe
Sent: Sunday, February 04, 2007 3:49 PM
To: mhayes at asiaaccess.net.th
Cc: pynchon-l at waste.org
Subject: Re: AtDTDA (2): 30 Railroad Watch

Interestingly, the standard timekeeping system related to this
arrangement of time zones was made official in the United States by an
Act of Congress in March 1918, some 34 years following the agreement
reached at the international conference. In an earlier decision prompted
by their own interests and by pressures for a standard timekeeping
system from the scientific community - meteorologists, geophysicists and
astronomers - the U.S. railroad industry anticipated the international
accord when they implemented a "Standard Railway Time System" on
November 18, 1883. This Standard Railway Time, adopted by most cities,
was the subject of much local controversy for nearly a decade following
its inception. . . .