Professor Hamilton's Diary: Sept. 28, 1935

An explosion shakes his neighborhood; daylight savings time begins.

An ordinary Saturday for the Hamiltons concluded with a boom at 11 p.m., “startling all our neighborhood,” he wrote. “Later proved to be a Dynamite blast in W. Lebanon & not an earthquake.” The explosion actually occurred shortly after 10 p.m., according to newspaper reports. The turning back of clocks for daylight savings time that night may accounted for Professor Hamilton’s discrepancy.

Despite the professor’s measured words, this was no small explosion. Paid subscribers can read on about what happened that night.

This mildly racy photo on the front page of the Reading Times today reminded subscribers to turn their clocks back. This year, DST does not begin until 2 a.m. on November 3.