How were timezones fixed by countries? Why did some countries get 3 timezones and some get only 1 despite being the same size? How did we get all the countries to measure time globally using the same measurement?

Question

How were timezones fixed by countries? Why did some countries get 3 timezones and some get only 1 despite being the same size? How did we get all the countries to measure time globally using the same measurement?

In: Earth Science

Answer 1

In 1878, Canadian Sir Sandford Fleming proposed the system of worldwide time zones that we use today. He recommended that the world be divided into twenty-four time zones, each spaced 15 degrees of longitude apart.

United States railroad companies began utilizing Fleming’s standard time zones on November 18, 1883. In 1884 an International Prime Meridian Conference was held in Washington D.C. to standardize time and select the prime meridian. The conference selected the longitude of Greenwich, England as zero degrees longitude and established the 24 time zones based on the prime meridian. Although the time zones had been established, not all countries switched immediately. Though most U.S. states began to adhere to the Pacific, Mountain, Central, and Eastern time zones by 1895, Congress didn’t make the use of these time zones mandatory until the Standard Time Act of 1918.