Tomorrow is leap day!
What is leap year? It takes about 365 days 6 hours for the earth to rotate around the sun. To make up for the extra 6 hours each year, one day every four years is added so that we don’t end up with winter in July and many other strange occurrences.
Now why February was chosen that I am not quite sure.
I decided to have a little fun with my family tree to celebrate leap year. What celebrations happened on this day in my ancestral family lives. I found only 3 celebrations for that day in my tree, but with all the blank spaces in my research there must be more.
The genealogy program I have on my lap-top is Legacy. In the Legacy program there is, like most other programs, an application that allows you to make a calendar. In Legacy you can print/view a whole year or just a month. I pulled up February of this year and found the following celebrations in my family tree. This would be the path to find the calendar in Legacy>Reports>Books/Other>Calender Creator. There is also Calendar List Report just below Calender Creator that you can use as well.
In 1804 on the 29 of February, Edmund Hallett was born to Samuel and Phebe Hallett Hallett. Edmund is the 4th great-great grandson William and Elizabeth Fones (Winthrop, Feake) Hallett which makes him my 3rd cousin 6 times removed, pretty removed I would say. Phebe is the descendant of William and Elizabeth. I have nothing on his father Samuel but I would not at all be surprised if he was also descended from Elizabeth and William.
The 29 of February 1872 Miss Jeannette Mitchell Thompson was born to William J. and Ellen Binnie Thompson in Dundee Illinois. Miss Jeannette is the wife of Harris Aleck Campbell. Helen Amelia Thompson Sunday is her sister and William Ashley Sunday her brother-in-law. Miss Jeannette is not related to me by blood she is a step daughter to my great-grand Aunt Anna Kaye.
On 29 of February in the of 1876 Mr. David Watt Burgess m. Miss Margaret (Maggie) Kaye daughter of Byron and Ellen Smith Kaye. David was the son of William and Elizabeth Ann Watt Burgess. They married in Woodstock, Oxford, Ontario at the home of Mrs. Ellen Kaye. Note to self, I wonder if they celebrated Sadie Hawkins in 1876 in Canada did Maggie ask David for his hand, or did David see an opportunity to only have an anniversary every four years and off the hook for the other three. Interesting thoughts!
Who in your family tree celebrates an important day on 29 of February? Check it out and have some fun! Here is a List of Leap Years.
Happy Hunting!
Julie Hogston - Visit Website