A correction to my previous post. I mistakenly had identified Chicago as being in the eastern time zone. Disregard the post from 14:52:32. The corrected version is below:


Here's the deal (follow it if you can):

Most of Indiana is in the Eastern time zone (EST), the same zone as New York. The extreme southwest portion (arounds Evansville, bordering Kentucky and Illinois) and th extreme northwest (Gary, just outside of Chicago), is in the Central time zone (CST), the same zone as Chicago. This means that between the end of October and the beginning of April, 12:00 in New York (EST) is 12:00 in most of the state (EST), 11:00 in Chicago (CST), and 11:00 in Evansville and Gary (CST).

When Daylight Savings time came around, most of the state decided not to go along with it. However, the extreme southwest, extreme northwest, and extreme southeast portion of the state (around Madison, bordering Kentucky and Ohio) wanted to stay on the same time as their neighbors, so they opted to go with the change (northwest and southwest are CDT, sourtheast is EDT). This means that between the Beginning of April and the end of October, 12:00 in New York (EDT) is 12:00 in the southeast corner (EDT), 11:00 in most of the state (EDT), 11:00 in Chicago (CDT), and 11:00 in the Evansville and Gary area (CDT).

If you look in your Windows 95 Date/Time settings, there is a separate time zone setting for Indiana. Choosing this option disables your Daylight Savings Time checkbox.

Yeah, I know. If they could have made it more complicated, they would have. I've lived in the state for 3 years, used to live in NYC, and think this failure to go along with the rest of the country is one of the stupidest anachronisms I've ever seen. Every year, people complain about it, and every few years, local politicians make a lot of noise about changing the rules to get us in sync with the rest of the country. Nothing ever happens.

And people wonder why I don't wear a watch...