Alois Treindl wrote:
So whether it was DST or not, at the time given in the article light cannot have started to fail
That depends on what the article's author Bill Dow meant by "fail". In a burning city, light could "fail" well before astronomical sunset.
You say in your comment that you have seen "multiple reports that (Shanks DST data) is incorrect."
I am curious what those other reports might be.
Sorry, I don't remember the details. As I vaguely recall, the situation in Michigan was chaotic. The state rebelled against the federal daylight-saving law, some counties rebelled against the state, cases went to the state supreme court which may have (temporarily?) suspended the state's suspension of DST, and I don't know of any reliable catalog of what actually happened that year in Detroit. Perhaps someone could spring the money and read all the stories in the Detroit Free Press and Detroit News archives related to daylight saving time that year. I expect there would be dozens of stories to wade through. Let's hope the competing newspapers in Detroit didn't follow the model of Nashville in the previous decade. That Nashville story is so entertaining that it should be promoted from our email archive to the northamerica comments. Proposed patch attached.