The Day Line Again by R. F. Cottrell

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jan 7, 1873

The Day Line Again.

By R. F. Cottrell

A FRIEND writes me: “With your proposed journey around the earth, I fully agree, so far as you go, or nearly. If you start from Yeddo, and that city is twenty miles inland, or west of the Pacific shore, it will be 12 o’clock M., Jan. 1, at any place you inquire, until you arrive at Yeddo, and there it will be Jan. 2, 12 o’clock M.”

This statement is just twenty miles from the truth. You would be told that it was Jan. 2, as soon as you touched the shore. If the Japanese, living only twenty miles apart, should say, in one place, “It is Jan. 1,” and in the other, “It is Jan. 2,” and in both places tell the truth, it would prove that there is a day line, and that it is drawn between those two places. My friend continues: “Or, if you please, start from San Francisco, and, at any place you please to inquire, it will be Jan. 1, 12 o’clock M., providing you travel 15° per hour, as you propose, until you have gone over the Pacific Ocean, Asia, Europe, Atlantic Ocean, and America; at San Francisco, the answer will be, 12 o’clock M., Jan. 2.”

This statement is false, all the way from Yeddo to San Francisco. There is no disagreement in the day on both continents. But, if you cross the Pacific, you find yourself out of harmony with the rest of mankind. And if you could cross it a hundred times in twelve hours, it would be the same—you would pass out of one day into another, every time. This fact proves that there is a day line, and that it lies in the Pacific Ocean. R. F. COTTRELL.