Blog > Vintage Leap Day postcards
2020 is a Leap Year, so how about a look at some old postcards illustrating one of the best-known Leap Day traditions? If you’ve never heard of this, the tradition is that on Leap Day (and only on Leap Day!) women can propose to men.
In 2012, Huffington Post rounded up this and other marriage superstitions related to Leap Day around the world: in some countries, it’s bad luck, while in Finland if the man refuses he has to pay a fine and give the poor lady enough material to make a skirt. (In times past that was a pretty significant fine, and a useful gift!)
Take a look at some of these postcards we found!
The Scottish tradition is that proposing women had to wear a red petticoat as a sort of warning to let men know they were going to propose… but I’m not sure how anyone could check on the petticoats of some of these ladies! We don’t think they’d let you try… (quite right, too!)
We had no idea that Leap Day postcards were a genre of their own, but we found a whole collection of them curated by Alan Mays on Flickr, as well as the others we gathered above! Do you know any other traditions or stories related to Leap Day in your country?
Tags: postcards-history, vintage
33 comments so far
Did you know that it was Julius Caesar who was the first to introduce the leap year? He introduced a leap day, at the time of ancient Rome, because he had noticed that the calendar year was out of phase with the solar year. Normal, since the Romans had cut the year into twelve months of 29 and 31 days and their year had 355 days. In several years, they had accumulated 90 days in advance ... The seasons were completely shifted! Suddenly, days were added here and there to readjust everything…
But sometimes the citizens who lived far away from the capital were not aware of these additions of days, so that the year 46, in particular, was a big mess! The Romans called it "the year of confusion." Two leap months were added between November and December to catch up with the whole gap at once. A year that was long, with 445 days.
In France, on February 29, we can read "La Bougie du Sapeur".
The newspaper "La Bougie du Sapeur" is a UFO editorial that only appears on February 29. It will release its eleventh number in 2020 "in the tradition of French humor", according to the description made by its editor, Viscount Jean d'Indy. The newspaper takes its name from Sapper Camember, a wacky and clever soldier, invented in the 19th century.
In the United States, the city of Anthony in Texas throws birthday festivals every leap year for people born on February 29. For several days at the end of February, a "Leap Year Birthday Festivals" welcomes people from all over the world. The idea came from two city residents who wanted a special day for their birthday.
Here in France there is a newspaper that is released each 29 february since 1980:
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Bougie_du_sapeur
I will try to buy it this year (never done before but I've heard about it since a long time).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_Disease_Day
February 29....so excited!
Hmmm...we've been through the little town of Anthony, TX (near El Paso)...will have to plan a trip that way around a Leap Year sometime. Happy Birthday to Leslie Martin and all who celebrate that day, too.
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