HUB History - Our Favorite Stories from Boston History

Since we “fell back” to Standard Time this past weekend, Boston has been forced to adjust to 4:30 sunsets. To help us understand why the sun sets so early in Boston in the winter and what we could do about it, we’re going to replay a classic episode about how the idea of time zones and standard time was born in Boston, with the help of the Harvard Observatory. And because we’re talking about the observatory, we have to share the story of the women who worked as human computers at the Harvard Observatory.

Please check out the full show notes at: http://HUBhistory.com/158/

And support the show on Patreon. Boston Standard Time

• Marking Modern Times: a History of Clocks, Watches, and Other Timekeepers in American Life, Alexis McCrossen
• “Time Balls: Marking Modem Times in Urban America, 1877-1922,” in the American Culture Review, by Alexis McCrossen
• Selling the True Time: Nineteenth Century Timekeeping in America, by Ian Bartky
• “The Distribution of Time” in The North American Review, by Leonard Waldo
• We also discussed the Harvard Observatory in our episode about the women who worked there as “human computers.”
• The Woods Hole Time Ball
• “The Boston Time Ball” via Brown University’s Ladd Observatory blog.
• “America’s First Time Zone” via the Harvard Gazette
• “The New Time Ball About to be Installed at Boston, Mass,” in the Jeweler’s Circular and Horological Review
• Work at the Royal Greenwich Museum and watch a time ball drop every day
• A Boston Globe editorial arguing in favor of joining Atlantic Time
• A Hartford Courant editorial arguing against joining Atlantic Time
• The report of the Massachusetts Time Zone Commission

Boston’s first time ball, on the Equitable building Equitable building exterior Equitable building exterior Boston’s second time ball, on the Ames building An 1879 railroad guide, listing dozens of time zones An 1896 railroad guide, after standard time zones My own graphic showing what our move to Atlantic Time could look like Harvard’s Human Computers Williamina Fleming Henrietta Swan Leavitt Annie Jump Cannon Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin Harvard computers pose in 1918. Photo courtesy of the Harvard College Observatory. Henrietta Swan Leavitt (r) and Annie Jump Cannon (l) in 1913. Photo courtesy of the Harvard College Observatory.

• Hat tip to the Self Rescuing Princess Society blog for first introducing us to Williamina Fleming and the Human Computers.
• As long as we’re at it, some praise for the children’s book Rejected Princesses for sharing Annie Jump Cannon with the next generation.
• Williamina Fleming’s journals from 1900.
• kept by Henrietta Swan Leavitt, Annie Jump Cannon, and Cecilia Payne, or the volumes yourself.
• Two views of a nebula discovered by Williamina Fleming.

A nebula discovered by Williamina Fleming. Photo by Sara Wager

• An article about the computers, including Annie Jump Cannon’s obituary for Williamina Fleming.
• Williamina Fleming’s obituary in the Annals of the Royal Astronomical Society.
• An article about the .
• An article focusing on the long evolution of the computers from menial workers to full professors.
• Here’s that book by the Harvard physician who claimed that girls who are “apt to be quick, brilliant, ambitious, and persistent at study … need not stimulation, but repression.”

Annie Jump Cannon in Rejected Princesses Annie Jump Cannon in a Wonder Woman comic Boston Book Club

Two years ago, a legislative commission looked at what it would mean if Massachusetts moved to the Atlantic time zone, effectively keeping Daylight Saving Time year round. In the end, their conclusions were fairly optimistic for those of us who hate 4:30 sunsets. They said that Massachusetts residents would likely be happier, healthier, and wealthier than they are now, due to increased economic activity, opportunities for fitness activities, and evening sunlight. However, they stressed that we could only move to Atlantic time if the other New England states came along, as well. Read their report, and then listen to the episode to find out what the other states are up to.

Upcoming Event(s)

David J Silverman of George Washington University will be giving a presentation titled “This Land is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving” in two different Boston events. Here’s how the event is described:

Ahead of the 400th anniversary of the first Thanksgiving, historian David J. Silverman offers a transformative new look at the Plymouth colony’s founding events, told for the first time with the Wampanoag people at the heart of the story, in This Land is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving. Silverman is a professor of Native and Colonial American history at George Washington University and has worked with modern-day Wampanoag people for more than twenty years. Through their stories, other primary sources, and historical analysis, Silverman sheds profound new light on the events that led to the creation, and bloody dissolution, of the alliance between the Wampanoag tribe and the Plymouth settlers. The result complicates and deepens our current narrative of the first Thanksgiving, presenting us with a new narrative of our country’s origins for the twenty-first century.

You can see the presentation at 6pm on Monday, November 18 at the Massachusetts Historical Society, or at noon the next day at the Boston Athenaeum. In both cases, admission is $10 and advanced registration is required.

Don’t forget about recent podcast guest Nancy Seasholes’ upcoming event for the Atlas of Boston History. She’ll be appearing at the Mass Historical Society with Bob Allison, Jim Vrabel, and Richard Garver at 6pm on November 14.