Milestones: February 29, 2024

February 29, 2024 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

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CAESAR AND LEAP YEAR — THE HISTORY OF LEAP YEAR AND LEAP YEAR DAY IS COMPLICATED AT BEST, and is the result of Roman Empire leaders’, including Julius Caesar, efforts to reconcile the astronomical solar year with the civic calendar, or at least the one in use at the time. Julius Caesar, for example, set a uniform standard to the practice of adding an Intercalaris month to make sure the calendar kept in sync with the seasons (otherwise Easter, a spring holiday would wind up occurring as the foliage turned red and started falling.) Thus, the Julian calendar is named after him. It was based on the solar year being determined as having 365 days and 6 hours. An adjustment of one full day every four hours seemed to rectify the problem. Then, in 1570, Pope Gregory XIII established a more accurate calendar that, although was slow to catch on with various countries, is still in use today. Leap Year Day, as it was called, came into existence around 1584.

The Gregorian calendar excludes centurial years (those ending in 00) that were not evenly divisible by 400. Thus, 1600 and 2000 were leap years, but not 1700, 1800 or 1900.

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WOMEN GET TO PROPOSE — LEAP YEAR DAY OVER THE CENTURIES GAVE RISE TO A NUMBER OF UNCONVENTIONAL CUSTOMS, PARTICULARLY IN LOVE AND MARRIAGE. A tradition from 5th-century Ireland holds that a woman, later canonized as St. Bridget, complained to St. Patrick that it was forbidden for women to propose marriage to men. According to legend, St. Patrick designated one day that is not annual — February 29 — as a day when women would be permitted to propose. Leap Year Day thus became known as Bachelor’s Day. In the Mediterranean region, however, Greeks believed it unlucky to get married on Leap Year Day.

About five million people worldwide were born on Leap Year Day, February 29 and they are called ‘Leaplings.” Among them are American entertainer Dinah Shore (1916-1994), bandleader Jimmy Dorsey, and American NASA astronaut Jack Lousma, who turns 88 today) and a number of athletes, including hockey players Cam Ward and Henri Richard; Olympic-medalist swimmer Cullen Jones; and Major League Baseball players Al Rosen and Pepper Martin.

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EIGHT OSCARS FOR MOVIE— THE CLASSIC 1939 MOVIE, “GONE WITH THE WIND,” on Feb. 29, 1940, won eight Oscars awarded by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Based on the Margaret Mitchell novel, the movie was an epic Civil War-era romance that won Best Director for Victor Fleming, as well as Best Picture, Best Screenplay, Best Cinematography, and Oscars for the Art Direction, Film Editing, and Actress categories. However, the night’s highlight was the Best Supporting Actress Award, which was presented to Hattie McDaniel for her portrayal of “Mammy,” a housemaid and former enslaved woman. McDaniel became the first African American actor to win an Oscar.

However, this award did not come without criticism: Liberal African Americans sharply upbraided McDaniel for accepting a role in which her character, a former slave, was nostalgic about the Old South.

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BLAMED RACISM FOR RIOTS — THE KERNER COMMISSION, FORMALLY KNOWN AS The President’s National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, on Feb. 29, 1968, released its report that blamed racism as the primary cause of a rioting surge. President Lyndon B. Johnson had appointed the 11-member commission the previous year with the mission of finding solutions that might end the riots. The commission was named for its head, Governor Otto Kerner of Illinois. The report declared (in part) “our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white — separate and unequal,” and urged expanded aid to African American communities to prevent further racial violence and polarization.

The report also refuted a claim that African American political groups were fomenting conspiracy, instead blaming “white racism” for the 150-plus riots that broke out in the U.S. between 1965-1968, including deadly incidents in Newark and Detroit.

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THE SACKING OF DEERFIELD — THE OUTPOST OF DEERFIELD, MASSACHUSETTS, WAS BESIEGED DURING AN OVERNIGHT ATTACK ON FEBRUARY 29, 1704, by Native Americans and their French allies and the inhabitants were either slaughtered or captured. The Deerfield raid was the bloodiest event of Queen Anne’s War, also known as the second of the French and Indian Wars, and named after the English monarch at the time. This attack came to be known as the sacking of Deerfield, and a great story of survival, and sacrifice. A courageous minister, the Reverend John Williams, and about 110 other survivors were captured and forced to march 300 miles north into enemy territory in Canada. The survivors kept the will to live and were later ransomed by the royal governor of Massachusetts. Rev. Williams later penned a memoir that became one of the first best-sellers in American history.

A more recent book published in 2034 is historian James Swanson’s “The Deerfield Massacre: A Surprise Attack, a Forced March, and the Fight for Survival in Early America.”

See previous milestones, here.