UNIFORMITY OF CLOCKS THROUGHOUT GREAT BRITAIN .
Now that railway-travelling has become so universal in the kingdom, doing so much to annihilate space, the question of time became a matter of considerable importance, and he had long been of opinion that some plan must be adopted to prevent the errors and inconvenience of every town in the kingdom setting its clock to a meridian of its own, different to every other place out of the same longitude. To show the extent of the evil to which he adverted, it would perhaps be sufficient for him to state, that there was a difference of 25 min. 28 sec. between the times at Dover and Falmouth ; that is to say, when it was noon at Falmouth it was 25 min. 28 sec. past noon at Dover. There was nearly a minute difference in time between the east and west of London, and about a quarter of minute difference between the east and west of Birmingham. The railroad directors have endeavoured to remedy this defect, by keeping London time at all their stations ; but there was this great inconvenience attending it, that all persons who resided west of London, were in great danger of being too late for the trains. On all the time-tables of the Great Western Railway, an endeavour was made to remedy this difficulty, by printing the correction for longitude. It occurred to him a year or two ago, that it would be a very excellent plan if government would recommend the adoption of one uniform time throughout the kingdom ; and he was happy to find that his friend Mr. Dent had turned his attention to the same subject, and he quite agreed with him that they ought to adopt one meridian as a universal standard, and call it “British time. ” Happening to mention this subject to his friend, Mr. Rowland Hill, as a matter of some importance in connexion with the post-office department, he informed him that he had received a letter from Captain Basil Hall in 1840, on this very point ; and as it embodied all that he (Mr. Osler) could say respecting it, he would, with the permission of the audience, read the letter to them . [The lecturer here read the letter of Captain Basil Hall. ] The idea of the adoption of a general standard for time throughout Great Britain originated with the late Dr. Wollaston, who suggested that all the post-office clocks throughout the different counties, should be kept at London time , a measure which he considered might be very easily accomplished, and which would greatly simplify all those arrangements of the post-office in which time was included as an element. He proposed to regulate all the post-office clocks in the kingdom, by means of the time brought from London daily by the mail-coach chronometers; and he had no doubt that, ere long, all the town clocks, and , eventually, all the clocks and watches of private persons, would fall into the same course of regulation; so that only one expression of time would prevail over the country, and every clock and watch indicate by its hands the same hour and minute at the same moment of absolute time.—From Mr. Osler’s Lecture at the Birmingham Philosophical Institution
The Illustrated London News, London England, May 14, 1842