In the book I read about Benjamin Franklin, there was a snippet about how he became fascinated by a candle that didn't produce smoke.
It stoked his imagination, and being a thinker and a scientist, he considered how important candles were to life. Once it got to be dark, you had to light one. And of the course of an evening, a week, a month, or a year, he ran through many candles.
And so he wrote a short piece about how if there was more daylight, then the need for candles would be reduced. He did a little math and determined that Parisians could save millions of French Livre every year if they had an hour of extra daylight, and didn't have to buy candles.
That was pure Franklin magic. He was good at dissecting a topic and giving a point of view that was well reasoned and proffered an idea. He was quite good at that. And that's why "Doctor Franklin" was si beloved.
The story itself went mostly unnoticed.
That is until 1916, when the Great War started, and Europe was looking for ways to focus attention and cut some costs. And so they turned to Franklins work, and twisted a little. It would be good for their war effort... and thus began a path of daylight savings time. Savings more or less being about saving money on candles, and oil in the evenings.
