There was a time, in our agrarian past, when ending daylight savings time early in the fall made sense. But like the three-legged milk stool and bucket, there is no practical use for light mornings and dark evenings.

That’s why a plan to extend daylight savings time by four weeks is welcome. It’s just too bad the original plan to add a full two months didn’t gain enough support in Congress.

Many decades ago, much of society benefited by ending daylight savings time early in the fall as days shortened and the change made for more light in the morning. Farmers, particularly, liked having natural light in the fall and winter mornings to make it easier to harvest, do chores, and milk cows. And, rural residents felt better about their young children walking down long driveways to the bus when it was a little lighter outside.

Today, modern farming is almost completely unaffected by when the sun comes up. And fewer people live in rural areas and more of them drive their children to school, or at least to the end of the driveway.

Daylight savings time now begins in April and ends in October. Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., originally sponsored a bill to extend daylight savings time by an extra month on both ends. That plan drew some opposition from PTAs who worried about kids going to school in the dark and by

the airlines who didn’t want to pay to tinker with their flight schedules.

But the arguments in favor of Markey’s plan were strong enough that House and Senate negotiators agreed to a four-week extension of daylight savings time &045; starting a week earlier and ending three weeks later. The bill is in the much larger energy bill, which is still being debated.

One of the big selling points for extending daylight savings is that it saves energy because it is lights out when people get home from work. One congressional estimate puts the savings at 100,000 barrels of oil a day or $171 million in savings a year.

Retailers say they will also benefit from more early evening shopping if there is still light outside.

For those of us in northern states, an extended daylight savings is especially welcome. Dealing with winter is tough enough without having to watch darkness settle in at 4:30 in the afternoon while people are still at work.

Most people would take a darker morning commute to work or school in exchange for a little more light at the end of their day. Extending daylight savings time is long overdue and should be extended even further.

(The Mankato Free Press)