Leap Year— a brief history

It started all the way back in 45 B.C. According to an article by National Geographic, Julius Caesar propelled the use of the Leap Year calendar, with help from his astronomer buddy, Sosigenes of Alexandria. Caesar was influenced to start the Leap Year calendar during his time in Egypt. At that time, the Egyptians added an extra month which was inserted when astronomers observed the correct conditions of the stars. Instead of relying on the stars, however, Caesar just opted to add a day to every fourth year

We have Leap Year because the number of days it takes Earth to complete a full revolution around the sun is actually not an even number. Most people think it’s 365 days, but it’s in fact 365.24 days.

Later, in 1582, Pope Gregory XIII further refined the Julius calendar with the rule that leap day would occur in any year divisible by four. The major difference is that Leap Day would occur every four years but would not occur in years that are not divisible by 400. Because of this, years like 1700 or 1900 did not have a Leap Day, but 2000 did. This is known as the modern calendar we use today, the Gregorian calendar

According to USA Today, Feb. 29 is the rarest day that folks have a birthday. However, one Hallettsville resident was lucky enough to be born on Feb. 29. Slade Hagan, age 23, considers himself special because of this.

“The funny thing is it’s special, but at the age I’m at now, it’s just another day. But it’s still really cool,” Hagan said. “People always get a kick out of it when I tell them my birthday. My parents and I were talking about it and out of everybody in the world, which is close to seven billion people, there’s only 4% of the population of the world that has a Leap Day birthday.”

This is true, birth records indicate that only one-in-1,461 people are born on Leap Day every four years. Hagan almost always celebrates his birthday on March 1.

“I typically celebrate my birthday on March 1 because that’s the easiest time for me to celebrate,” Hagan said. “Most people say the proper way to celebrate your Leap Day birthday, however, is to start on Feb. 29. Then, after each subsequent year, you celebrate on March 1, then March 2, and finally, March 3. After that, on Leap Year, you reset to Feb. 29.”

Hagan aims on celebrating his birthday this year with a nice dinner with his family, and some quality fishing time near the coast.

Some famous celebrities born on Leap Day include motivational speaker, Tony Robbins; frontman of the band Foster the People, Mark Foster; and even the Prime Minister of Spain, Pedro Sanchez.

There are a couple of towns that are known as the “Leap Year Capital of the World.” Anthony, Texas is one of those towns and they even hold a four-day leap year festival. At this festival, a big birthday party is hosted for all leap year babies, according to their Wikipedia page.

Because Leap Day is once every four years, there isn’t much that typically happens. The earliest interesting occurrence that happened on Leap Day include that the first Salem Witch Trials warrants were issued in 1692, according to the Chicago Public Library.

The Oscar Academy Awards were also held on Leap Day in 1940. According to Oscar records, Hattie McDonald was the first African American actress to receive a win for Best Supporting Actress as her role as Mammy in “Gone With the Wind” that day. In a more recent occurrence; Davy Jones, singer and performer of The Monkees, died on Leap Day in 2012.

Some people claim that proposing to your loved one on Leap Day can bring good luck. So whatever way you would like to spend this year’s Leap Day, be sure to take advantage of the extra day of the year. After all, we won’t be seeing that day for another four more years.