Originally Posted by
chewybrian
It seems Ben Franklin first thought of it, to more closely match the daylight with the time people were most active.
The ironic thing is that according to the wikipedia link provided by dynodonn, Franklin was actually proposing the idea satirically because the French, in his opinion, didn't seem to be able to get out of bed early enough to suit his tastes. So if the French can't get out of bed early enough, lets turn the clocks back so it will seem as though they do. A modest proposal to be sure.