Expert: Joseph Logue - 10/27/2004

Question
I may have the wrong chap to ask bur here goes:
Without the use of alarm clocks before they were ivented( apart from the street caller 5'o'clock and all's well) how were people able to get up for work especially in rural areas?

Answer
Hello Geoff,

You're right -- this is outside my area of expertise, but your question got me wondering, too.  I will weigh in with my thoughts, though I have no solid proof.  I think as far as rural areas go, sunrise probably sufficed.  In rural areas, too, there were animals, domestic or barnyard, who have never needed alarm clocks.  How many time are you woken up by the sound of barking dogs at 5:30 a.m.?

My other thought is that the time before alarm clocks was also, roughly, the time before electric lights.  While there were candles, of course, and kerosene lamps and gaslight, probably many rural people went to bed when it got dark.  You can only sleep so many hours a night, so getting up early was natural.  There is also the probability that they got up because they were used to waking up at that time (how many times do you wake up just before your alarm goes off?).  They also, simply, had to.  I have gone to bed very late many times, knowing I had to be up at 5:30, and I did it, as do millions of people every day.

Now, trying to make this a more formal answer requires that if I don't know something, I try to refer you to places that may.  I cannot find anything on the Web; however, a book entitled "How Do Astronauts Scratch an Itch?" by David Feldman, promises to answer that very question.  It may be available in a local library.  If you cannot get there, a Reference Librarian may be able to find the answer for you, if you give him or her the title of the book.

Sorry if this was a little long, but your question intrigued me.

Best of luck to you.

Sincerely,
Joseph Logue