Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, January 7, 1992 TAG: 9201040165
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: NF1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: WENDI GIBSON NEWSFUN WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
A CRAZY CALENDAR IN '92
ELAINE Casey has been a teacher's aid at G.W. Carver Elementary School for almost 27 years.And she's only 14 years old.
Danielle Russo of Roanoke is in the sixth grade at William Byrd Middle School, and she'll be 3 on her next birthday.
What do these two people have in common?
Neither is a super-hero, but both were born on Feb. 29, a day that occurs only once every four years.
And both will celebrate birthdays this year for the first time since 1988.
Feb. 29 is a special day because it marks a leap year in the calendar. A leap year has 366 days, one more than an ordinary calendar year.
The calendar year is based on the sun. It is a solar year and is the time it takes the Earth to revolve once around the sun - about 365 days, five hours, 48 minutes and 46 seconds.
To account for the extra five hours or so that don't quite make up a day, we add an extra day to our calendars every four years.
This, however, makes the calendar year 11 minutes and 14 seconds longer than the solar year. Therefore, we do not add the extra day in the century years, except to those evenly divisible by 400. The years 1500, 1700, 1800 and 1900 did not have the extra day. The year 2000 will, and so our calendar year and solar year will only be off by a day over several thousand years.
Pretty simple huh?
Danielle's family celebrates her birthday differently than Elaine's, who is 56 years old in ordinary years.
Elaine says although she wanted a birthday party every year, like her brother and sisters had, she was made to wait four years, for the 29th of February. "I never knew when my birthday was going to be." The hardest part for her was waiting, she said.
And Elaine's siblings would tease her, good naturedly of course, because she didn't get a birthday as often as they.
But her family made up for Elaine's seemingly unfortunate birth date by having big parties for her.
"Oh there was a crowd," she recalled. "People thought it was fun to have a birthday on the 29th. But I told them `No, you'd have to wait [to have a birthday party].' "
Because she's older now, she celebrates her birthday annually.
Danielle has always celebrated her birthday every year, usually on the 28th of the month or the first of March. By ordinary years, she'll turn 12 next month, but by her actual birth date, she'll only be 3. The only problem she has with her birth date is explaining it to people who don't understand the leap year concept.
Elaine insists that it's a pleasure to be born on the 29th of February, a day that must be special since it is a rarity among the other days of the year.
And, as she tells it, she and Danielle are "real dignitaries" because they share such a special day.
Better gobble that birthday cake this year, it's going to be a long wait for the next February 29!