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Newfoundland Time
DCHP-2 (May 2016)
Spelling variants:Newfoundland time, N.T., NT
n. — especially Newfoundland
the time zone in Newfoundland and parts of Labrador.
Type: 1. Origin — The importance of the name Newfoundland Time and its derivatives (see links) is best illustrated by the original discussion in the 1910 quotation (how to name the new time zone), the 1963 governmental move, opposed by the people, to move to Atlantic Time (the time zone of the Maritimes) and the 1987 pragmatic reasoning for Newfoundland Time (see the respective quotations). Newfoundland Time is 3.5 hours behind Greenwich Mean Time in the winter from the second Sunday in November to the second Sunday in March.
Quotations
1910
HON. MR. BISHOP - I would like to ask if the "colonial time" is considered a good term? It sounds to me rather audacious for Newfoundland to adopt the term "colonial time." It seems better to call it "local" time or "Newfoundland" time.
HON. MR. ANDERSON - There is no particular reason for it.
HON. MR. BISHOP - I am rather doubtful about adopting the term "colonial" time. I would rather have it called Newfoundland time.
HON MR. GREENE - Make it Newfoundland time. Let us have a time of our own - a good time.
HON. MR. ANDERSON - There is no particular reason for it.
HON. MR. BISHOP - I am rather doubtful about adopting the term "colonial" time. I would rather have it called Newfoundland time.
HON MR. GREENE - Make it Newfoundland time. Let us have a time of our own - a good time.
1928
When the Columbia dropped lightly down on the landing field at Harbor Grace, at 8.03, Newfoundland time, tonight, Miss Boll stepped to the ground fresh and not at all tired.
1949
A traveller going to St. John's from Central Station here will pass through three time zones en route - Eastern, Atlantic, and Newfoundland time.
1963
A good many Newfoundlanders, it appears, want to keep their own time zone despite a move by Premier Smallwood's Liberal government to bring the province into Atlantic time. [...] This province now operates on Newfoundland time, 3½ hours behind Greenwich time and half an hour ahead of Atlantic time, which is standard in the Maritime provinces and eastern Quebec. When it is noon in Halifax and 11 a.m. in Ottawa it is 12:30 p.m. in St. John's.
1987
A recently-released government green paper offers Newfoundlanders several compelling reasons to question the wisdom of continuing to observe their idiosyncratic half-hour time zone.
While most Canadians view with humor Newfoundland Time jokes, Newfoundlanders' main complaint is not so much with being stuck between time as being stuck in the dark most of the time.
1999
Actually, the new year doesn't reach North America officially until 10:30 p.m. EDT, when the new day begins in the continent's most easterly land mass, Newfoundland. But the folks on the Hibernia oil rig, the man-made island east of St. John's, are declaring their own time zone for this one occasion, and CBC will be on hand to record their pre-emptive partying.
Also celebrating early will be a group of expatriate Newfoundlanders in Fort McMurray, Alta., who will be keeping Newfoundland time. CBC cameras will link 72 Newfoundland families with loved ones in Alberta as part of its coverage.
2004
Western Labrador was back on Atlantic time, but after getting off the Goose Bay-Cartwright ferry, the eastern shores of Labrador were in the Newfoundland time zone. To make matters worse, Blanc-Sablon, where the ferry left Quebec for Newfoundland, was back on Eastern time like the rest of Quebec - but the ferry operated on Newfoundland time! I had been asking folks what time it was for days, setting and resetting my watch and GPS.