DC Hilton was one of the first Americans to find out that there was money to be made in the middle of the night. 42 years ago he bought a small restaurant on US highway 69,in Oklahoma. His main customers were truck drivers and traveling salesmen who drank coffee and ate cheeseburgers when they stopped to break their journey.
It was they who first tried to persuade Hilton to remain open all night. He thought about it for a while and then suddenly made up his mind. He the door key and threw it across the road. He hasn’t closed the door since.
Over the years his simple burger cafe has expanded into a 24-hour roadside empire, with a 100-seat restaurant ,a petrol station, a mini shopping market, a car park for mobile homes(活动住房)and all-night self-help laundry.
Hilton was a pioneer in a 24-hour working trend which has now caught on around the world. Today not only restaurants but also banks, supermarkets, mail-order firms, travel agencies and many other businesses are beginning to be open all night.But is this really a good thing?
A lot of research has been done in America on the effect of 24-hour working, and there is growing concern_about the long-term dangers of a society that doesn’t sleep. Americans are said to be sleeping 20% less than they did 100 years ago, and 55% claim to suffer at least occasionally from over-tiredness. Several of the worst man-made disasters happened in the last few hours before dawn, when even the most experienced night-worker has difficulty staying awake.