Twice a year it’s the same ritual. We change our clocks back one hour in the fall and move them forward one hour around springtime. The ritual that is daylight-saving time.

While it is seen as a hassle for some to go around and change each clock in their home, do many people realize why we partake in this clock changing biannually? Just by the name alone, it’s obvious we are conserving daylight hours. There is actually a long history behind daylight-saving time. As an added bonus, changing your clock also is a good way to remember to change the batteries in your smoke alarms. Change your clock, change your battery is just a little helpful reminder that could one day turn into a lifesaver.

In helping remind you to move your clocks forward one hour on Sunday, we dug up a few interesting facts about how this practice came to be, courtesy of webexhibits.org:

• The idea of daylight-saving time was first conceived by Benjamin Franklin in 1784 during his stay in Paris as an American delegate. He discussed it in his essay, “An Economical Project.”

• First there was standard time, which was brought about by the railroads in the United States and Canada in 1883. Prior to that, time of day varied by each town. The onset of railroading meant a standard time needed to be set to ensure schedules were maintained.

• Arizona does not observe daylight-saving time, but the Navajo Nation does. Because of this, there is a donut-shaped area of Arizona that does observe the time change, but the “hole” in the middle does not. It’s also not observed in Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands or the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands.

• Controversy has long-brewed in Indiana. While the state’s two western corners, which fall in the Central Time Zone, observed daylight-saving time, the remainder of the state, in the Eastern Time Zone, followed year-round Standard Time. All was put to rest in 2005, however, when Indiana legislators implemented daylight-saving time statewide.

• Studies done by the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) in 1975 showed that daylight-saving time trims the entire country’s electricity usage by a small, but significant amount. Despite a report by the National Bureau of Standards disputing the study in 1976, DOT’s findings continued to influence decisions about daylight-saving time.