British English vs. American English. Is There a Difference? Give us your thoughts.
General Discussions ( Anything Goes )
Jack, having grown-up in the pre-digital age, I am familiar with all the variations you cite as the UK versions of telling time. We regularly used and interchanged all those terms when telling time here, too. The one exception: Five and twenty past four. While everyone would have understood what that meant it would have been considered "Sunday School" English, or King James English.
The terms "top of the hour" and "bottom of the hour" date back to at least the nineteenth century with the adoption of "Standard Time." This was precipitated by a head-on collision between two passenger trains in New England claiming many, many lives. Prior to that disaster railways operated on disparate clock settings based on their city of origin. Each community in America kept its own time by using an "official town observer" who daily marked the apogee of the Sun's trek across the sky. The town clock was then set (or reset) at 12:00 o'clock noon accordingly. Everyone in town then set their pocket watches to the town clock. The idea of Standard Time was staunchly resisted at first but eventually prevailed.
In addition to "Standard Time" the nation adopted time zones. All railway employees (from engineer, to janitor, to porter, to conductor) were required by law to carry "authorized" time pieces and twice each hour--at the top of the "hour" and atbottom of the "hour"--the driver/engineer was required to blow the train's whistle and every employee---without exception--was required to stop whatever they were doing to check and if necessary synchronize their time pieces. The law's generic reference to the "hour" was substituted for the actual hour toaccommodate the disparate time zones.
When I was a kid I listened to "Wolfman Jack" every night on the radio. He played rock 'n roll! He always gave the time as "twenty before the hour or twenty after the hour." The big question in high school or at the malt shop afterwards was "Where is the Wolfman?" A lot of kids thought he might be local DJ but I knew that couldn't be because I listened to him on XERF from Ciudad Acuna, Mexico a 100.000 watt AM station. It turns out that he was in the basement of his home in Southern California "broadcasting" to a lone reel-to-reel tape recorder. After the "broadcast" the tapes were quickly reproduced then taken across the border into Mexico and driven by car to each of the 100.000 watt stations located along the U.S./Mexican border stretching across three U.S. time zones. Adding to his stealth, the Wolfman never mentioned current events (i.e. news) or the weather. This was designed to keep his whereabouts cloaked but he inadvertently created a whole new genre of "feel good, good times" rock 'n roll!
