Have you ever wondered where time zones came from? Apparently in the 1880s most towns in America had their own local times based on "high noon" or when the sun is at its highest. Since every city used a different time standard more than 300 local sun times were used. When railroads began to shorten the travel times between cities, scheduling and railroad timetables became difficult to maintain.

To make the railway system more efficient, the railroad companies created four standard time zones for the continental United States on November 18, 1883. In 1918 Congress officially adopted the railroad time zones and put them under the supervision of the Interstate Commerce Commission.