NOTE: The letter below is from Amanda Owen, President of the Philadelphia Astrological Society (PAS). It concerns her efforts to determine how birth times were recorded in Pennsylvania prior to April 12, 1971. The letter explains the astrologer's dilemma in obtaining accurate birth times for astrological charts in this state.

Dear Friends,

Thanks for your interest in the Pennsylvania Time Project (PTP). Following is some information about the PTP, a request for information, and my most recent list of Pennsylvania hospitals. I am hoping you can assist me with my research for the Pennsylvania Time Project. I am in the process of compiling data concerning how Pennsylvania hospitals recorded birth time information on the hospital birth record prior to April 12, 1971. Many astrologers are unaware that many hospitals in Pennsylvania did not record birth times in local time prior to this date.

Pennsylvania hospitals were required to record the time of birth on the hospital birth record as Eastern Standard Time even when Eastern Daylight Time or War Time was being observed. This law or regulation was in effect up until April 12, 1971. After that date, birth times were recorded in local time.

Here in the Philadelphia area, many hospitals followed this policy, some did not, and many are simply unknown.

I, myself, have seen hospital birth records that clearly had written after the time of birth, the letters EST even when the birth occurred during the summer or during War Time. The records I have seen where this was written were all prior to April 12, 1971. Years ago, I spoke to a nurse working in the maternity ward of Bryn Mawr Hospital in Bryn Mawr, PA, who told me that prior to 1971, the clock in the delivery room was set to Eastern Standard Time all year round because of a regulation that they had to follow.

I spent hours in Jenkins Law Library with law librarians assisting me and have been unable to locate any law concerning the recording of birth times. I have only found laws about how time should be observed - but not recorded. I have concluded that what I am looking for must have been in a regulation of some kind. I have contacted hospitals who have been unable to help me. The people I have spoken to are not at all familiar with hospital policy from 25 years ago.

Thomas G. Shanks, the person who compiled both the time changes and the latitudes and longitudes for The American Atlas wrote in the Pennsylvania section that a law was in effect up until April 12, 1971 that all birth times be recorded as Standard Time. He also mentions that this law was infrequently observed which is not accurate at least in the Philadelphia area. I was able to contact Thomas Shanks via email thanks to Mountain Astrologer readers who furnished me with the information - but I have not received a reply from him regarding how he came about obtaining information about the recording of Pennsylvania birth times.

I wrote to the Pennsylvania Department of Health who informed me that the only data that they could find related to this was that hospitals began reporting birth times in Daylight Savings Time in May of 1972 but do not have any specific information as to why.

My plan is to compile a list of Pennsylvania hospitals detailing which ones used Standard Time and which ones stuck with local time. The hospitals I have so far, are all from documented sources meaning that either the letters 'EST' 'EWT' 'EDT' or 'DST' (daylight savings time) are written on the birth record after the time of birth. The other documented source is one that comes from hospital personnel who have access to hospital policy.

I am including a list of the hospitals that I have firm documentation for. I will update you as I get more information. I will have my own web site in the near future where I will update information as it comes in. Soon, as part of the International Directory Project through AFAN, the information should be available. We are still in the process of getting it up and running - so stay tuned. AFAN's web site is http://www.afan.org. The Philadelphia Astrological Society (PAS) also has a link to the PTP. You can reach PAS at http://www.bnatural.com/pas/index.html.

If any of you has knowledge about any of the following, please contact me at the address below.

1. Was this directive to hospitals a law or a regulation?

2. When did it begin? And, did it indeed conclude in 1971?

3. Does anyone have a copy of this regulation?

4. Do you have information about any hospitals in Pennsylvania concerning how they recorded their birth times?

People born in Pennsylvania can get a copy of their Birth Record by writing to the following address or calling the following phone numbers. Since in Pennsylvania, with rare exceptions, the Birth Certificate does not list the time of birth, you will need to request the Birth Record also known as the Hospital Record. Be extremely clear about this when you are ordering or they automatically send the Birth Certificate! The fee is $4.00. Make your check payable to the Division of Vital Records. If you order by phone, you will need a credit card and there will be an additional $5.00 fee charged to your credit card.

Division of Vital Records
State Dept. of Health 
Central Building 
101 S, Mercer St. 
PO Box 1528 
New Castle, PA 16103
724-656-3100 

By the way, the web site where you can obtain addresses for all states to obtain birth information is: http://vitalrec.com/index.html

Anyone who can put this letter and the list of hospitals on other web sites or forward this email - please do so! Help pass on the information! Email me any names of people who are interested in receiving updates via email.

Thanks in advance for your help. I can be reached by any of the following.

Please include any documentation you have - a copy of a birth record or a letter from hospital personnel. Include your phone number and I will get back to you with any questions.

Amanda Owen 
PO Box 502 
Lansdowne, PA 19050
phone: 610-623-9575

*** Additional Information from Amanda Owen:

1)  Astrologer Linda Waters has reported that she quizzed a person in Medical Record at Abington Hospital which is located in Montgomery County who reported that this hospital recorded births as Standard Time all year around until the early 1950's. After that the hospital recorded in local time. Although there is nothing yet official, both Linda Waters and myself feel that the Standard Time works for our clients who were born prior to 1950.

2)  Astrologer, Diana Roche, reported that another astrologer in the Sabian Assembly, who worked for years at Delaware Valley Medical Center in Bristol, PA, verified that this hospital had the delivery room clocks set to Eastern Standard Time (EST) all year round prior to 1972 and that births were recorded as EST until 1972 (when all PA hospitals began to record birth times according to local time.)  (8/5/99)

3)  Astrologer Ellen Perchonock reports that she saw the birth record of a family member who was born on June 9, 1950 in the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP), located in West Philadelphia.  The letters EDT followed the listed time of birth.  As noted earlier, the recording of the time with the EDT letters means that the hospital is indicating that they were not following the Pennsylvania regulation that all birth times be recorded as Standard Time.  (9/15/99)

4)  I have two hospitals that I think used EST to document births but do not have anything firm.  It is not uncommon in Pennsylvania for a mother to insist that the birth time for her child is exactly one hour off than the time the hospital lists, or for a mother to document in a baby's book a birth time which is different thatn the officially listed time on the hospital birth record.

The two hospitals that have come to my attention are Women's Hospital of Philadelphia and Chester-Crozer Hospital of Chester, Pennsylvania.  Because of more than one report about discrepancies in the recording of birth times fromthese two hospitals, I feel fairly confident that both hospitals recorded birth times as EST during EDT.  Please forward any personal experience you have with these hospitals to Amanda Owen at Avowen@aol.com.
 

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