Greenwich Observatory Time for the public benefit' : standard time and Victorian networks of regulation

摘要

The widespread adoption of standard time in Britain took more than fifty years andsimple public access to a representation of it took longer still. Whilst the railways and tele-graph networks were crucial in the development of standardized time and time-distributionnetworks, very different contexts existed, from the Victorian period onwards, where time wassignificant in both its definition and its distribution. The moral drive to regulate and stan-dardize aspects of daily life, from factory work to the sale of liquor, led to time being used as atool for control. Yet, as a tool, it was problematic, both in its own regulation and in theregulation of its distribution. Companies such as the Standard Time Company, in creatingbusinesses out of time distribution, found themselves at the heart of discussions of time andstandards, acting, as they did, as a nexus between the nation's master timekeeper, the RoyalObservatory, and London public houses, Lancashire cotton mills and myriad small businesses.We can see this network both literally, in electric wires, clocks, batteries and relays, andmetaphorically, transmitting Victorian moral concerns of ' power ' and ' intelligence ' betweenimperial state and individual. Naturally enough, the network itself was as contested as themessage it transmitted.