Are Clocks the Only Way to Track Time?

Tracking Time

Time is an elusive thing. For some it drags, for others it flies by and for others (possibly those who naturally manage their time well) it keeps a steady pace never speeding up never slowing down. Now days we track time with our watches and clocks. Some of us go so far as to have cuckoo clocks that announce the time for us on an hourly basis. If for some unknown reason the power goes out or the batteries go dead, we can find the time on the internet or we can call the telephone company and get a recording of current time. How did we get to this point?

In ancient times (even before grandfather clocks) we kept time by the sun, if it was light, it was daytime, if it was dark it was night. Sundials and water clocks marked the hours, minutes and seconds were not considered. Now there may have been some advantages to this system, because the assumption was 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of darkness. So in the summertime when the days were longer the "hours" could be as long as 80 minutes in the daytime, but at night the "hours" were only 40 minutes long. Of course in the winter time that was reversed. So in the summer, you could get a whole bunch done in an "hours" time, but of course in the winter not as much could be accomplished in the same amount of time. Unfortunately they didn't know about Daylight savings time then either. Of course there are questions left begging, like if you got paid by the hour, was the pay rate the same for a 80 minute hour as it was for the 40 minute hour? If the day started at sunup who started the clock and what happened if you slept through sunup? This could be a very confusing situation. The astronomers of those times realized there was a regularity in the movement of the heavenly bodies and they tracked the "time" of those using a pendulum which was patiently and meticulously manned by a live astronomer interested in knowing the "time" factor involved in the rotation of the earth, moon, sun and other planets. Then in 1657 a gentleman by the name of Christiaan Huygens figured out that he could make a windup apparatus with pulleys and wheels and could make a pendulum swing and keep a steady time. Thus minutes and seconds came to be a part of our time tracking system.

In time, pendulum clocks, such as grandfather clocks, wall clocks and cuckoo clocks became the way time was tracked. As technology advanced we invented more kinds of timekeeping devices. Until now, day or night doesn't matter as much as the numbers on the clock. In the summer (thanks to daylight savings time) we get off work at nearly "midday" and enjoy a long light leisurely evening. We watch the clock and go to bed during the "daytime" because the clock says it's nighttime. How far we have advanced!!

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