February is a unique month, and especially in 2024. Since it is a Leap Year, February gets to have an extra day added to it and, for that, we shall celebrate. In all seriousness, February does hold some fascinating nationally recognized days and, in this article, we will explore four of February's very best!

It was during World War II, on Feb. 3, 1943 that a troop ship, the U.S.A.T. Dorchester, sank due to a collision with a German submarine. The U.S.A.T. Dorchester, first launched in 1926, was a coastal passenger steamship used by the War Shipping Administration as a troopship distributed to the United States Army.  On Jan. 23, 1943, the ship, destined for Greenland, set out from New York Harbor with 904 U.S. officers, servicemen, and civilian workers, along with four chaplains. On its journey, the ship was led by three U.S. Coast Guard commissioned vessels called Cutters. Very early on Feb. 3, one of the cutters detected the presence of a submarine nearby. However, it could not tell where it was positioned. Just off of Newfoundland, at 12:55 a.m., the U.S.A.T. Dorchester was hit by torpedoes coming from the German submarine U-233. Passengers began to panic, and it was at this time that the four chaplains: George L. Fox (Methodist), Alexander D. Goode (Rabbi), Clark V. Poling (Baptist), and John P. Washington (Catholic), came together to aid in the ensuing chaos. As the ship was sinking, the chaplains began working together to create an organized evacuation plan and aided in calming the passengers. The chaplains helped the passengers into lifeboats, and all four gave away their own life vests to passengers who needed them, as the ship did not carry enough to go around. The four chaplains sacrificed their lives to protect others with a great show of courage. The website Awareness Days expresses that, in the chaplains' final moments: “they linked their arms together, saying prayers and singing hymns, went down with the ship.”

On Dec. 19, 1944, the Chaplains were acknowledged for their sacrifice with the Purple Heart and Distinguished Service Cross awards. According to the Home of Heroes website, Congress, in July of 1960, authorized the “Four Chaplains Medal” and on it was depicted the Star of David, Tablets of Moses and the Christian Cross, along with the four chaplains' names. In 2006, a medal of honor was presented to all of the Chaplains. 

On Feb. 3, take time to remember the inspiring sacrifice of the four chaplains, and acknowledge their heroic deed.

For America, the start was said to have begun in 1909, when a Chicago publisher became lost in the fog of England. He was aided by a Boy Scout who refused payment because he insisted that helping him was simply doing a good deed as a Boy Scout. It is said that this incident is what caused the start of Boy Scouting in America, as when the publisher returned home he was encouraged to start up a national U.S. scouting organization which, in 1910, officially became the Boy Scouts of America. Quickly, it began to fill the U.S. with various Boy Scouting groups. 

Today, the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) consists of over one million youth members and 628,000 volunteers. The BSA has grown to include programs for all of America’s youth striving for the betterment of the youth as individuals and as members of the wide world. According to the BSA official website, they state that their scout mission “is to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Scout Law.”

National Boy Scouts Day acknowledges the good deeds, learning, and development of moral foundations that the BSA has been instilling in America’s youth since day one of its creation on Feb. 8, 1910.

Thomas Edison was born on Feb. 11, 1847 in Ohio. As a child, he received very little formal education and, at the age of 13, he had even found himself a job at the railroad very near where he was living at the time in Michigan. He managed to secure a weekly payment of $50 a week by selling both newspapers and food to the train passengers, which was extremely impressive for a person of his age at the time. As the American Civil War made its entrance, Edison found a keen interest in the area of telegraphy (the long-distance transmission of messages), but the growing technology began to implement auditory signals, which left Edison at a disadvantage. When Edison was young, he experienced a substantial amount of hearing loss, which History explains was “variously attributed to scarlet fever, mastoiditis or a blow to the head.” Despite his auditory dilemma, Edison saw it as an inspiration to find a way to combat his inability to pursue telegraphy, and to open up greater possibilities for himself despite his deafness. In 1869, his journey as an inventor began.

One of Edison’s most recognized inventions was the phonograph, which was able to reproduce sounds through vibrations. Britannica stated that “the public’s amazement surrounding this invention was quickly followed by universal acclaim,” which led him to be projected into “worldwide prominence.” However, the phonograph was not his only invention. Edison’s work included the incandescent light bulb, the motion picture camera, the alkaline battery, and the carbon microphone, among others. Even more notably, Edison is recognized for the number of patents he created to encourage innovation, which was about twice as much as any other American inventor. History expressed: “By the time he died at age 84 on October 18, 1931, Thomas Edison had amassed a record 1,093 patents: 389 for electric light and power, 195 for the phonograph, 150 for the telegraph, 141 for storage batteries and 34 for the telephone.” Edison's innovation not only impacted America, but also the world. He is recognized for the incredible amount of inventions he brought to light, and for the impact he made.

On Feb. 11, which is also Thomas Edison’s birthday, look around and admire the inventions that make up the world we live in, and appreciate not just the work of Edison, but the intricate minds of all inventors who have worked to shape the world today.

According to National Geographic, the decimal difference, though it may seem insignificant, can eventually affect the seasons, causing them to fall in different months than they are supposed to. To the extreme, it could cause school years to not start in the fall, but rather in the spring, which would be a growing confusion as time went on. In order to fix this, a man from as far back as 100 BC, Julius Caesar, thought of a way to fix the confusion by implementing an early form of the “Leap Day”. National Geographic explains that “Caesar made a 365.25-day year—a tiny bit longer than the 365.2422 solar year—that added a Leap Day every fourth year.” Despite Caesar's change, the calendar still was not quite lined up, as every 128 years, the calendar became a day short. Fast forward to the 16th century, the calendar dilemma had still not been fixed, and holidays had drifted a whole ten days from their original place. Pope Gregory XIII of Rome, in 1582, decided to create his own calendar, where he dropped 10 days from the month of October in hopes of re-syncing the calendar. He also instituted a Leap Year system using the original 365.2422 solar year, where every four years a “Leap Day” would be added and, along with it, every 400 years, three Leap Days would then be dropped in order to prevent the calendar from drifting again. The calendar and concept of the “Leap Year” had been a long debated subject but, after many tries, Pope Gregory finally found a working solution. In fact, Pope Gregory’s “Gregorian” calendar is still being used today and has remained successful in keeping the world's seasons aligned. 

Though confusing, the history of the “Leap Year” is quite fascinating and, ultimately, a very important addition to our world’s calendar. On this “once every four years chance”, enjoy the extra day in February and appreciate the hard work that went into designing a way to keep our calendar and seasons in line.