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Weird but true history: Why the calendar skipped from October 4th to the 15th in 1582

Those 10 days simply don't exist…sort of.

Photo credit: Canva

The switch to the Gregorian calendar messed up our measurement of time for a bit there.

If you think crossing time zones and navigating Daylight Savings Time can be confusing, imagine losing or gaining multiple days just by crossing a border.

That was life for Europeans in the late 16th century after 10 days were eliminated from the Gregorian calendar. In 1582, if you lived in a Catholic country, the calendar went from October 4 to October 15—the dates in between just didn't exist. As a result, you could find yourself going back or forward in time simply by entering or exiting a non-Catholic country.

What happened to the missing 10 days in October of 1582?

The mystery of the missing days isn't so much a mystery as a miscalculation. For nearly 1,600 years, the Julian calendar had been used by people across Europe, and on the surface it wasn't a whole lot different than the Gregorian calendar we use today—365 days in a year with a leap year every 4 years and the spring equinox being placed on March 21.

But there was one problem: It was off on how long a solar year is by 11 minutes and 14 seconds.

That may not seem like much, but after over 1,000 years, it added up. Placing a leap year every four years without exception meant that the equinox was slowly pushed back on the calendar. By the mid-1500s, the equinox fell on March 11 instead of March 21. As a result, the calculations for Easter were thrown off.

How the Gregorian calendar recalibrated the spring equinox

After years of consultations among church leaders about how to fix the problem, Pope Gregory XIII signed an edict implementing a new calendar system—the Gregorian calendar we use today—in February of 1582. As part of the implementation, 10 days were removed from October during weeks that wouldn't affect any of the Christian holidays to get the equinox back to March 21.

But losing those days wasn't seamless. For one, since the change came from the pope, non-Catholic countries weren't too keen on taking up the new calendar. Austria, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Poland, and the Catholic states of Germany switched to the Gregorian calendar, but Protestant and Orthodox countries of Europe resisted. They all came around eventually, but it took more than 100 years for the British Empire to jump on board, and some countries, including Russia, Turkey, Greece, Albania, Lithuania, and Estonia, didn't make the switch until the 20th century.

In the meantime, the removal of October 5 to 14 meant that dates were different in different countries—and in some cases even within the same country. Germany was split by Catholic and Protestant regions, so the two different calendars made travel between those regions really weird date-wise. (Imagine trying to navigate that kind of chaos in today's global neighborhood. Good thing they didn't have airplanes then.)

Leap year calculations in the Gregorian calendar are a little more complicated

Now, one might ask, "If the Julian calendar had a leap year every four years, didn't that account for the length of time in a solar year? How is that different than the leap years we have in the Gregorian calendar?"

The answer is that the way leap years work in the Gregorian calendar is a bit more complex than many of us realize. Most of us were taught that we have a leap year every four years, which is generally true, but with some regularly scheduled exceptions. We don't hear about these exceptions because they happen so infrequently and won't happen within our lifetime, but they make all the difference mathematically.

via GIPHY

In the Gregorian calendar, we add a day to the calendar (February 29th) every four years except on years that can be divided by 100, which are not leap years, unless the year can also be divided by 400, in which case it is a leap year. That might sound confusing, but essentially, 1700, 1800, 1900 were not leap years, but 2000 was. The years 2100, 2200 and 2300 will not be leap years, but 2400 will be.

Removing those leap years every 100 years but not every 400 years accounts for the miscalculation in the Julian calendar, just as removing the 10 days from October of 1582 fixed the drift that had occured over millennia because of it. There are still different calendars used in different places for different purposes, but the Gregorian calendar has gradually become the international standard for dates and times.

Time may be a construct, but humans have managed to construct quite a detailed system of measuring it, even with some quirky bumps along the way.

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Education

Have you ever heard of the Ludlow Massacre? You might be shocked when you see what happened.

It's important to know your history.

via Colorado Coal Field War Project/University of Denver Library.

Strikers, Ludlow Tent Colony, 1914.


The early 1900s were a time of great social upheaval in our country. During the years leading up to the Ludlow Massacre, miners all around the country looking to make a better life for themselves and their families set up picket lines, organized massive parades and rallies, and even took up arms. Some died.

It's always worth considering why history like this was never taught in school before. Could it be that the powers that be would rather keep this kind of thing under wraps?

Here is Woody Guthrie's tribute to the good people who fought in the battles of Ludlow to help make a better tomorrow for everyone — you can just start the video and then start reading, if you wish:

Coal Country, Colorado

100 years ago, the Rocky Mountains were the source of a vast supply of coal. At its peak, it employed 16,000 people and accounted for 10% of all employed workers in the state of Colorado. It was dangerous work; in just 1913 alone, the mines claimed the lives of over 100 people. There were laws in place that were supposed to protect workers, but largely, management ignored those, which led to Colorado having double the on-the-job fatality rate of any other mining state.

It was a time of company towns, when all real estate, housing, doctors, and grocery stores were owned by the coal companies themselves, which led to the suppression of dissent as well as overinflated prices and an extreme dependence on the coal companies for everything that made life livable. In some of these, workers couldn't even leave town, and armed guards made sure they didn't. Also, if any miner or his family began to air grievances, they might find themselves evicted and run out of town.

strike, economy, money works, Union parade

Strikers, Ludlow Tent Colony, 1914.

Union Parade, Trinidad, Colorado, 1913. Images via Colorado Coal Field War Project/University of Denver Library.

The Union

The United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) had been organizing for many years in the area, and this particular company, Colorado Fuel and Iron, was one of the biggest in the West — and was owned by the Rockefeller family, notoriously anti-union.

Put all this together, and it was a powder keg.

The Ludlow colony, 1914 massacre, Colorado Coal Field War

The Ludlow Colony before the massacre, 1914.

Photo from Youtube video.

tent colony, mining, miners

Strikers, Ludlow Tent Colony, 1914.

Photo from Youtube video.

families, National Guard, unions

Strikers, Ludlow Tent Colony, 1914.

Photo from Youtube video.

Strike!

When a strike was called in 1913, the coal company evicted all the miners from their company homes, and they moved to tent villages on leased land set up by the UMWA. Company-hired guards (aka “goons") and members of the Colorado National Guard would drive by the tent villages and randomly shoot into the tents, leading the strikers to dig holes under their tents and the wooden beams that supported them.

Why did the union call for a strike? The workers wanted:

  1. (equivalent to a 10% wage increase),
  2. Enforcement of the eight-hour work day,
  3. Payment for "dead work" that usually wasn't compensated, such as laying coal car tracks,
  4. The job known as “Weight-checkmen" to be elected by workers. This was to keep company weightmen honest so the workers got paid for their true work,
  5. The right to use any store rather than just the company store, and choose their own houses and doctors,
  6. Strict enforcement of Colorado's laws, especially mine safety laws.
calvary, Trinidad, striking women

Cavalry charge on striker women in nearby Trinidad.

Photo from Youtube video.

UMWA, Rocky Mountains, President Woodrow Wilson

Militia and private detectives or mine guards, Ludlow.

Photo from Youtube video.

The Powder Keg Explodes

The attacks from the goons continued, as did the battles between scabs (strikebreakers) and the miners. It culminated in an attack on April 20, 1914, by company goons and Colorado National Guard soldiers who kidnapped and later killed the main camp leader and some of his fellow miners, and then set the tents in the main camp ablaze with kerosene. As they were engulfed, people inside the tents tried to flee the inferno; many were shot down as they tried to escape. Some also died in the dugouts below the burning tents. In the first photograph below, two women and 11 children died in the fire directly above them. A day that started off with Orthodox Easter celebrations for the families became known as the Ludlow Massacre.

Woody Guthrie, child labor laws, worker rights

The "Death Pit."

Photo from Youtube video.

colony, coal country, University of Denver

Rear view of ruins of tent colony.

Photo from Youtube video.

funeral procession, Louis Tikas, Greek strikers

Funeral procession for Louis Tikas, leader of Greek strikers.

Photo from Youtube video.

The 10-Day War

The miners, fresh off the murders of their friends and family members, tried to get President Woodrow Wilson to put a stop to the madness, but he deferred to the governor, who was pretty much in the pocket of the mine companies.

So the miners and those at other tent colonies quickly armed themselves, knowing that many other confrontations were coming. And they went to the mines that were being operated by scabs and forced many of them to close, sometimes setting fire to the buildings. After 10 days of pitched battle and at least 50 dead, the president finally sent in the National Guard, which promptly disarmed both sides.

Union Victory

While close to 200 people died over the course of about 18 months before and after the battles at Ludlow and the union ultimately lost the election, the Ludlow Massacre brought a congressional investigation that led to the beginnings of child-labor laws and an eight-hour workday, among other things.

But it also brought national attention to the plight of these miners and their families, and it showed the resilience and strength that union people could display when they remained united, even in the face of extreme corporate and government violence. Historian Howard Zinn called it "the culminating act of perhaps the most violent struggle between corporate power and laboring men in American history." And the primary mine owner, John D. Rockefeller Jr., received a lot of negative attention and blame for what happened here.

monuments, April 20, 1914, coal miners, revolution

The UMWA is still a solid union today, and there is a monument in Colorado to those who died in the Ludlow Massacre.

Image by Mark Walker/Wikimedia Commons.

This article was written by Brandon Weber and originally appeared on 08.14.14


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Education

What's up with Wyoming? Video explains why it's 'empty' compared to twin neighbor Colorado

The states are almost identical in size, shape and geographical features, but Wyoming has 580,000 residents to Colorado's 5.8 million.

RealLifeLore/YouTube

Wyoming and Colorado have vastly different populations despite being geographically similar.

Most states in the U.S. have oddly shaped boundaries, largely formed by meandering waterways and coastal irregularities. But two states stand out for their seemingly defiant rectangularness—Wyoming and Colorado.

These almost-twin states share a border, are almost exactly the same size (Colorado is just 1.06 times larger than Wyoming), boast basically the same shape and have the Rocky Mountains eating into a sizeable chunk of them. (Wyoming's share of mountains is a bit larger than Colorado's, but its topography isn't nearly different enough than Colorado's to account for how many fewer people it has.)

Wyoming's population as of 2022 was estimated to be just over 580,000, while Colorado's was estimated to be just over 5.8 million. Almost exactly a 10-fold difference between the two very similar states.

So…why?

Water resources? A logical guess, but nope. Both states contain the headwaters of multiple major rivers, and according to RealLifeLore, Wyoming actually has a slight edge over Colorado due to the way its freshwater is legally allocated.

What makes Wyoming the least populous U.S. state despite being the country's 10th largest state by area has to do with the Gold Rush, agriculture, World War II, federal lands, the rise of the telecom industry, educational institutions, airplanes and more. It's a historical Tale of Two States that illustrates how twins with different upbringings can share many similarities but also end up with two very different life stories.

Watch the folks at RealLifeLore explain the population discrepancy between Wyoming and Colorado:

The one correction some people in the comments of the video offered up was that referring to the "mild" climate in Wyoming seems a bit misleading. Several people mentioned that the winter weather in Wyoming is harsher than in Colorado, which may account for fewer people wanting to live there. (However, considering the fact that there are more densely populated places in the world with exceptionally punishing winters, weather doesn't fully explain it, either.)

It'll be interesting to see in another hundred years or so if these states' population trends change, but for now, Wyoming remains the least populous and most naturally undisturbed state. So if you're big on the outdoors and not so big on people, the Equality State (Side fun fact: Wyoming was the first state to give women the right to vote.) might just be the place for you. If you love the mountains but also people, Colorado may be more your speed.


This article originally appeared on 5.10.23

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Education

A teen student delivered a masterclass on the true history of the Confederate flag

Christopher Justice broke it down into incredible details most of us probably weren't even aware of.

SM East/YouTube

Six years ago, a high school student named Christopher Justice eloquently explained the multiple problems with flying the Confederate flag. A video clip of Justice's truth bomb has made the viral rounds a few times since then, and here it is once again getting the attention it deserves.

Justice doesn't just explain why the flag is seen as a symbol of racism. He also explains the history of when the flag originated and why flying a Confederate flag makes no sense for people who claim to be loyal Americans.

But that clip, as great as it is, is a small part of the whole story. Knowing how the discussion came about and seeing the full debate in context is even more impressive.


In 2015, a student at Shawnee Mission East High School outside of Kansas City came up with the idea to have student journalists document students engaging in open discussions about various topics. In support of this idea, history teacher David Muhammad helped arrange a debate about the use of the Confederate flag in American society in his classroom.

According to the Shawnee Mission Post, Muhammad had prepared a basic outline and some basic guiding questions for the discussion, but mainly let the students debate freely. And the result was one of the most interesting debates about the Confederate flag you'll ever see—one that both reflects the perspectives in American society at large and serves as an example of how to hold a respectful conversation on a controversial topic.

The full discussion is definitely worth a watch. Justice had quite a few Confederacy defenders to contend with, and he skillfully responded to each point with facts and logic. Other students also chimed in, and the discussion is wildly familiar to anyone who has engaged in debate on this topic. For his part, Mr. Muhammad did an excellent job of guiding the students through the debate.

"I had Chris in class, so I knew he was super intelligent and that he read a lot," Muhammad told the Shawnee Mission Post in 2018. "But that really came out of left-field. He was never out there very much socially, so I didn't expect for him to want to speak in front of a crowd like that."

(In case you're wondering, according to LinkedIn, Christopher Justice is now studying political science at Wichita State University after switching his major from sports management. David Muhammad is now Dean of Students at Pembroke Middle School and also serves as a Diversity Consultant.)

Thanks, SM East, for documenting and sharing such a great discussion.


This article originally appeared on 08.05.21

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