Kankakee Valley Post, Volume 18, Number 10, DeMotte, Jasper County, 30 January 1948 — TINY MONTH STARTS, STOPS ON SUNDAY [ARTICLE]

TINY MONTH STARTS, STOPS ON SUNDAY

February, With Leap Year At Hand, To Present Rare Occurrence New York, Janfl 29 . A phenomenon which comes only three times in a century will occur Sunday with the arrival of a month beginning and ending on a Sunday. A month starting and ending on a Sunday can be only a leapyear February, 'of course, since months of 28, 30 and 31, days cannot start and end on the same day of a seven-day week. "What’s more, a February beginning and ending on Sunday requires a most extraordinary leap year, such as have been occurring at intervals of 28 years, another 28 years, then 40 years. “The next February of this sort will be in. 1976” Gordon Atwater, curator and chairman of the Hayden Planetarium here, pointed out today. “After that the 28-28-40-year sequence which so long has prevailed for this event will be broken, because of the fact that the century year 2000 will be a leap year. “After 1976, the next February coming in and going out on a Sunday will arrive only 28 years later—in 2004. That will make three consecutive 28-year intervals for the occurence of such a February, but one will come every 28 years three times more—in 2032, 2060 and 2088— before we have a 40-year jump again, and go back to the old sequence. The 40-year jump from 2088 to 2128 will result from the century-year 2100, which will not be a leap year.” Atwater explained why the century year 2000 would break the old 28-28-40 sequence by being a leap year and why the century year 2100 would bring the old sequence back again by not being a leap year. But we’d better not tr yto get into that here. Under the Gregorian calendar, introduced by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582 and adopted in Great Britain and the English colonies in America in 1752, every year of which the number is evenly divisible by four is a leap year; except the century years, which are leap years only when they the evenly divisible by 400.