45．Which of the following can be the
best title for the passage?
A．King Tut’s Tomb B．The Egyptian Tombs and Treasures
C．King Tut’s body D．The First Pharaoh’s Treasures
B
When it’s 10:15 in
New York, it’s 9:15 in Salt Lake City,
and 7:15 in San Francisco – isn’t it?
This consistent and orderly time system, based on a grid of time zones, seems
so natural that people rarely give it a moment’s thought. So you may find it
surprising to learn that prior to the late 1800s each community established its
own time – by looking at the sun. When the sun shone directly overhead in Washington, D.C., for
example, it was 12:00 noon there; up the road in Philadelphia,
however, it was 12:07, and in Boston
it was 12:24. To measure time with absolute accuracy, it is necessary to move
the clock about one minute for every twelve miles of distance; so according to “sun
time” your pocket watch would be slightly incorrect if you ventured only a few
miles down the road.
It was not until the advent of widespread railroad travel that a
need arose for regularized time. At one point over 300 local times were honored
within the country, making it literally impossible for trains to arrive consistently
on time everywhere. As a result, in 1883 the continental, United States was
divided into four time longitude. The standardization resulting from this
system proved so helpful that in 1884 the International Meridian Conference
applied the same procedure to establish time zones around the world. Thus, if
it is 11:07 p.m. in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, a little simple research will quickly determine
that in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, it is 9:07 A.M. – and not 9:15.