A look back at leap year and how the whole thing started

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The earth wants a bit greater than a yr to orbit the solar — 365.242 days, in reality.

However, as everyone knows, a calendar yr solely has one year. So, the early Romans got here up with an answer. Each fourth yr, they determined so as to add an additional day to maintain the calendars correct. The added day ultimately grew to become set as Feb. 29 and the years by which these additional days are current grew to become generally known as leap years.

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Leap day and intercalary year lore has existed ever since. Listed below are some enjoyable and becoming info about Feb. 29, since we’re about to mark this yr — 2024 — as a intercalary year:

• If there wasn’t a intercalary year each 4 years, Christmas Day — over the centuries — would grow to be a day that falls in the midst of summer time climate.
• Some early laptop packages expertise issues with the additional day, resulting in the time period “intercalary year bug.”
• Though marriage can — in fact — be proposed by girls lately (suppose Lindsey Vonn, Pink, Jennifer Hudson, Elizabeth Taylor, and so on.), in a long time previous a girl was supposed to attend for a man to pop the query. The exception was on Feb. 29, when society determined it was acceptable for girls to difficulty proposals.
• If a person refused a girl’s proposal on leap days, he was alleged to pay her a penalty starting from cloth in Finland to gloves and a rose in Scotland.
• Should you’re born on Feb. 29, you may be referred to as a leaper, or typically a leapling.
• The city of Anthony, Texas, declared itself the Leap Yr Capital of the World, after a member of the city’s Chamber of Commerce — herself a leaper — proposed the concept, noting no different group on this planet celebrated the occasion. A competition is held there, celebrating Feb. 29, and leapers — some from as far-off as Europe and Australia — collect as a part of the city’s Worldwide Leap Yr Birthday Membership.
• Whereas historic ancestors determined so as to add a day to the calendar each 4 years, scientists ultimately realized this gave us a bit an excessive amount of time. The answer? A intercalary year now happens each 4 years, until it’s a yr that’s divisible by 100. Meaning years like 1900 weren’t a intercalary year. However there’s an exception: If a yr that’s divisible by 100 can be divisible by 400, it’s going to grow to be a intercalary year. Thus, the yr 2000 was a intercalary year.
• A intercalary year can be referred to as an intercalary yr.
• A yr that isn’t a intercalary year is a standard yr.
• Calendars that acknowledge a intercalary year are primarily based on Gregorian calendars (the commonest on this planet), however different calendars comply with alternate practices to handle the earth’s 365.242-day journey across the solar. Some calendars add a complete month right into a given yr, a variety of instances every century.
• Whereas some cultures imagine getting married on Feb. 29 is fortunate, others see the day as unfortunate. In truth in Greece, one ballot indicated one in 5 {couples} say they keep away from getting married in a complete intercalary year.
• Various locations, golf equipment and points of interest around the globe maintain leap day events or specials this month. Bissextile year infants could even discover themselves getting particular remedy on Feb. 29, similar to free admission to points of interest such because the London Eye within the U.Okay. and the Skyjump on the Strat (the place you may be strapped right into a harness after which “leap” off the 108th ground of the construction, whereas hooked up to a zipline that takes you to the bottom.)
• The opera Pirates of Penzance performs on the intercalary year child phenomenon, when a younger man — dedicated to serve the pirates till his twenty first birthday — realizes he’s sure to them for 80-plus years, resulting from his Feb. 29 birthday.
• Within the comics, Superman was born on a leap day.
• Whereas some individuals additionally discuss with Feb. 29 as Sadie Hawkins Day, that pseudo-holiday — on which girls have been as soon as inspired to ask males on dates — really happens in November.
• Well-known intercalary year infants embody motivational speaker Tony Robbins, who was born Feb. 29, 1960, and this yr celebrates his sixteenth birthday. Rapper Ja Rule will have fun his twelfth birthday this Feb. 29. Actor Antonio Saboto Jr. will have fun his thirteenth.
• Calgary-based WestJet Airways additionally celebrates its birthday on Feb. 29; its first flight occurred on Feb. 29, 1996.

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For these born on Feb. 29, a joke about their age appears ongoing all through their lives. Through the years, the Calgary Herald printed these tales about intercalary year infants.

44 years in the past, from 1980:

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Right here’s an archived Herald story that confirmed a rise in marriages was occurring because the intercalary year began in 1928. Later information tales, nonetheless, indicated there was no statistical distinction within the variety of marriages in a intercalary year vs a non-leap yr.

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This 1932 intercalary year dance in Toronto ended with 12 {couples} changing into engaged, throughout which “women have been approved to suggest”!

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From 1936, listed here are a number of the Herald’s intercalary year tales, together with one a few intercalary year tea occasion. A draw prize for a cushion was received by the particular person with ticket #124! And, in a close-by advert, try these costs for a piano — beginning at $110.

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20 years in the past, from 2004:

And right here’s the story, by Jason Fekete, underneath the headline: Bissextile year infants able to occasion: Weekend bash and cake well worth the await Calgary women born on Feb. 29

It’s not simple going to highschool with classmates 4 instances your age — the taunting, the finger-pointing, being referred to as a child.

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Simply ask Jessica Draga and her finest pal Jalin Couper, who’re celebrating their “third” birthdays in the present day despite the fact that they’re in Grades 7 and 6 respectively.

No, the 2 women aren’t the Doogie Howsers of the actual world. They’re simply birthday-deprived.

Jessica and Jalin are leapers — intercalary year infants born 12 years in the past on Feb. 29.

So when you may solely really have fun your birthday as soon as each 4 years, it doesn’t go by unnoticed.

“I’ve all these individuals in school saying, ‘Hey, they’re three-year-olds,’ ” says the blond, brown-eyed Jalin, in a mocking voice.

“It’s so annoying typically.”

“Folks say, ‘What do you imply, the twenty ninth?’ ” provides blond, blue-eyed Jessica, shaking her head.

“They simply don’t perceive. Individuals are simply so dumb.”

Each women say they’ll obtain the spoils that include a uncommon birthday celebration — extra items, additional money and extra consideration.

However when the opposite three years roll round between birthdays, Jalin and Jessica get misplaced within the combine, not capable of take pleasure in their big day, say their dad and mom.

“I keep in mind each children at all times saying, ‘I don’t get to circle my day on the calendar,’ ” says Jane Couper, Jalin’s mother.

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The time period “intercalary year” is becoming for Jessica and Jalin as a result of they develop leaps and bounds between every birthday.

Subsequent time up, they are going to be driving age, which sends a jolt of terror by way of Jessica’s mother, Tammy, sitting in her Beddington-area house.

Couper rolls her eyes on the considered what may very well be in line 4 years down the highway.

“I can see her sixteenth (fourth) birthday being a reasonably large one,” she says. “We’ll have to start out planning quickly.”

Being dad and mom of intercalary year youngsters presents a handful of issues for Couper and Draga, who dreaded the considered a intercalary year child earlier than the women have been even born.

“I didn’t need to have it that day. I assumed, ‘No! No!,’ ” chuckles Draga.

“I used to be ecstatic that we have been having a child, however had unusual emotions figuring out that it was on the twenty ninth,” says Couper.

The 2 households met by way of a mutual pal when their women have been six months previous and Draga started babysitting each of them.

It’s been a wild trip ever since, however the children (and fogeys) stay finest mates, regardless of going to completely different faculties — Jessica’s within the public system and Jalin within the Catholic — and being in several grades.

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When Draga and Couper enrolled the women in elementary faculty, the cutoff date for registering college students was Feb. 28. Draga selected to push Jessica forward a yr, whereas Couper held Jalin again.

Comparable registration issues have dogged each households for years, with the dad and mom typically unable to enroll for sports activities or actions over the Web as a result of laptop calenders typically don’t embody 29 days in February.

Even with the complications, the dad and mom and youngsters preserve a way of humour in regards to the birthdays — or lack thereof.

“I believe once I’m 40 I’ll really be celebrating my tenth birthday and I’ll inform individuals I’m nonetheless younger,” Jalin says.

“These children won’t ever accumulate pension as a result of they’ll by no means be 65,” Couper jokes, earlier than including: “Jalin won’t ever date anybody as a result of she’ll by no means be of age.”

Draga says the 2 women are inseparable, linked by way of their big day.

“It’s like having twin sisters you didn’t plan for,” she laughs.

This yr, the women will have the ability to occasion instances two. Jessica held her personal occasion with Jalin and 11 different mates on Feb. 20, whereas Jalin’s bash is that this weekend, together with a sleepover and a pool occasion.

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Together with the partying, the opposite factor leap years are at all times good for is the reminiscences. Very like New Yr, it’s a type of uncommon days not forgotten in picture albums.

“As their lives go on, they’ll at all times keep in mind what they did on that day,” Couper says.

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Via the a long time, advertisers used leap years as a advertising instrument and infrequently promoted costs as once-in-every-four-year offers. Right here’s a take a look at a few of their intercalary year advertisements over time.

1928

The Hudson Bay Firm went “all in” for its 1928 intercalary year sale, selling a myriad of merchandise on sale for 29 cents, since there was a Feb. 29 that yr. You might buy something from velvet hats and pillow slips to washboards and inexperienced beans for 29 cents.

1940

1956

1978

1980

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