(Note: this episode originally ran in 2019.)
In the 1800s, catching your train on time was no easy feat. Every town had its own "local time," based on the position of the sun in the sky. There were 23 local times in Indiana. 38 in Michigan. Sometimes the time changed every few minutes.
This created tons of confusion, and a few train crashes. But eventually, a high school principal, a scientist, and a railroad bureaucrat did something about it. They introduced time zones in the United States. It took some doing--they had to convince all the major cities to go along with it, get over some objections that the railroads were stepping on "God's time," and figure out how to tell everyone what time it was. But they made it happen, beginning on one day in 1883, and it stuck. It's a story about how railroads created, in all kinds of ways, the world we live in today.
This episode was originally produced by Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi and edited by Jacob Goldstein. Jess Jiang is Planet Money's Acting Executive Producer.
Music: "You Got Me Started," "Star Alignment" and "Road to Cevennes."
Always free at these links: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, NPR One or anywhere you get podcasts.
Find more Planet Money: Facebook / Instagram / TikTok / our weekly Newsletter.
2024-12-24 12:38285 view
2024-12-24 12:271438 view
2024-12-24 12:151275 view
2024-12-24 11:36739 view
2024-12-24 11:30700 view
2024-12-24 11:101610 view
Donald Trump has promised to demolish the country’s domestic and international climate policies at a
Not only is it sweet that Ariana Grande ends her seventh album with a recorded snippet of her belove
The TEA Business College plans to issue ETA tokens for financing and further develop and enhance the