At the instance of the executive com
mittee of the national public school cel
ebration of Columbus Day. a bill was
recently introduced in congress instruct
ing President Harrison to issue a procla
mation making Columbus Day a gen
eral holiday. In the interest of scholar
ly accuracy this bill wisely authorized
th 3 change in date from Oct. 12 to Oct.
21. It has passed both houses of con
gress and received the president’s signa
ture.
Above all other dates nearly every
pupil in our public schools rememliers
that Columbus discovered America Oct.
12, 1402. They will all want to know
.why the 400th anniversary falls on Oct.
*2l, 1802.
For many centuries the calendar in
stituted by Julius Caesar, known as the
Julian calendar, was commonly accept
ed. This calendar assumed that there
were 865 >4 days in a year. But as this
made the year 11 minutes and 14 seconds
too long, it could not without correction
very long answer the purpose for which
it was devised. Consequently, in 1582,
it was found necessary to reform the
calendar, and the Gregorian calendar
was adopted. In order to correct the
errors that the old calendar had made.
10 days were dropped out, and Oct.
5 of 1582 became Oct. 15. As the
error was found to be exactly 8 days
in 400 years, the Gregorian calendar
omitted the leap year from every cen
turial year, excepting those which were
divisible by 400. Thus the years 1500.
1700 and 1800 were not leap years.
