Time Change is set for THIS WEEKEND.

Daylight Saving Time officially begins at 2:00am on Sunday (March 14th) – SO, before going to bed Saturday night, be sure to set your clocks FORWARD one hour.

As the old saying goes, “Spring FORWARD, Fall Backward”

The idea of Daylight Saving Tme, or DST, dates back to 1784 when Benjamin Franklin wrote a letter to a Paris newspaper proposing a tax on those whose windows were closed after sunrise.  The letter was meant to be satirical in nature, a simple joke, but the idea of moving the clock to lessen the dependence on energy sources – candles, at that time – began.

That change was officially put into action during World War I, when Germany put the plan in place in an effort to conserve fuel.  Europe came on board soon after, followed by the U.S. in 1918.

The practice was abandoned following the war; however it was started again in 1942 by President Franklin Roosevelt in an effort to conserve resources in World War II – the practice was made permanent in the U.S. under President Richard Nixon when he signed the Emergency Daylight Saving Time Energy Conservation Act in 1973.

And in 2005, President George W. Bush signed the Energy Policy Act, establishing the current schedule.  Clocks are set ahead one hour on the second Sunday in March, and back again the first Sunday in November.

NOTE:  Not every state goes through the “spring forward fall back” process each year; Neither Arizona or Hawaii observes Daylight Saving Time choosing instead to stay on standard time all year long.

(AL.COM/www.al.com)