Time zones
To those who have (had) a hard time with strange measurement units, here in Europe until few decennia ago (I did not encounter it) national time zones were off those 15° longitudes, which resulted when crossing borders in strange differences in time e.g. 19m 32,13s ...[/QUOTE]
I believe that was prior to WWII, when (e.g.) Amsterdam time (which was the official time for the Netherlands) was preceding Berlin time by around 20 minutes. In all countries that were occupied by Germany during the war, the Wehrmacht quickly changed that to our current time zones, separated by 1 hour. It was left at that after the war by most states in western Europe (I don't know about the countries behind the iron curtain) because it wasn't such a bad idea. (The Netherlands also retained wages taxes and "Kündigungsschutz", both pieces of German occupation legislation, after the war untill this day.)
To those who have (had) a hard time with strange measurement units, here in Europe until few decennia ago (I did not encounter it) national time zones were off those 15° longitudes, which resulted when crossing borders in strange differences in time e.g. 19m 32,13s ...[/QUOTE]
I believe that was prior to WWII, when (e.g.) Amsterdam time (which was the official time for the Netherlands) was preceding Berlin time by around 20 minutes. In all countries that were occupied by Germany during the war, the Wehrmacht quickly changed that to our current time zones, separated by 1 hour. It was left at that after the war by most states in western Europe (I don't know about the countries behind the iron curtain) because it wasn't such a bad idea. (The Netherlands also retained wages taxes and "Kündigungsschutz", both pieces of German occupation legislation, after the war untill this day.)