“Leaplings” celebrate unique birthday
Photo by Janelle Patterson Jack Brum finds a framed newspaper brief Thursday, which his mother Marilyn kept for many years, noting his unique Leap Year birthday.
Photo by Janelle Patterson Coulson Stout, 4, pauses to snack on cookies during his leap birthday photo shoot at Jill Martin's home photography studio in Waterford on Friday.
Photo by Janelle Patterson Jack Brum finds a framed newspaper brief Thursday, which his mother Marilyn kept for many years, noting his unique Leap Year birthday.
Photo by Janelle Patterson Coulson Stout, 4, pauses to snack on cookies during his leap birthday photo shoot at Jill Martin's home photography studio in Waterford on Friday.
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Leaplings, individuals born on Leap Day, technically only get to see their birthday once every four years.
“It’s my 16th birthday,” said Jack Brum, 64, of Reno, as he chuckled, pulling out an old photo this week.
Leap Day was first instituted during the Roman reign of Julius Caesar on Jan. 1, 45 BCE. Still, by the 16th century, the timing of Easter seemed to be slipping and Pope Gregory XIII commissioned a modified calendar that solidified the extra day occurring only every four years.
The Gregorian calendar, introduced in October 1582, is predominantly used by much of the globe today.
A special celebration
On Friday, Coulson Stout had a whole morning birthday photo shoot to mark the unique occurrence.
“He’s 4, but it’s also his first birthday,” laughed Kristin Stout, as she pulled out “Toy Story”-themed cookies for the shoot at Jill Martin’s photography studio in Waterford.
Coulson has been asking all week when his birthday is, and was adamant Friday that he was still 3.
“But tomorrow I’m 4,” he pointed out, as he wiped away icing from the cookie made at Lisa’s Sweet Stop in Beverly.
To celebrate and pay homage to the unique date of birth, Kristin wanted to commemorate the “first” birthday the way many families do, with a cookie smash, miniature tub photos and a themed photo shoot.
“We’ve been friends for a long time, so I thought this would be fun,” she laughed as Martin tried to convince Coulson to wipe icing on his nose.
Go-carts
One memory from Brum’s fourth year of life he still holds dear.
“In 1960, I was 4 years old, and dad was really into racing go-carts… I ended up winning a trophy and was the youngest racer there,” he described. “But, I had only had one birthday.”
Brum’s wife Nancy dove into the family’s archived photos and newspaper clippings to find the pictures of the event--winning a race in the Washington County Fair and ending up in the Columbus Dispatch’s Sept. 7, 1960 edition beside the oldest racer that year Everett O. Corners, of Beverly, who was 80 years his senior.
“It seemed my birthday meant more to mom than me, of course it was fun as a kid, she made a big deal about it,” Brum described. “She was always telling people I was born on Leap Day.”
This is his first birthday without his mother, Marilyn, who passed away last year at 86.
A Feb. 29 flood
Born in 1948, Robert Scoggan, of Warren Township, most vividly remembers the Leap Day his fellow celebrants were flooded in.
“I had a party years back out in a friend’s place on (Ohio 26) that’s abandoned now,” Scoggan described. “We had hot dogs and hamburgers and a couple kegs, but then the creek flooded and we couldn’t get out for three days.”
Scoggan still laughs about the ruckus the high waters caused.
“The whole house was plum full of people and by the end of three days we were out of food and drink,” he said.
Scoggan said he and his friends endured the impromptu three-day weekend, later having to explain to their employers they physically could not make it into work.
“That’s probably my favorite memory,” he laughed. “I’ve never met anyone else with the same birthday as me. On the off years I usually celebrate both days--well kind of in between Feb. 28 and March 1, at midnight.”
The lucky ones
“My husband will do picture cakes but put a picture from the year I was that age when we’re celebrating big every four years,” laughed Becca Leavitt, 44, of Parkersburg. “It’s my 11th birthday.”
She said considers herself lucky to have been born on the unique date.
“My mother always referred to me as her spirit of ’76,” she explained. “I think it became even more special for me when my child was young enough to still find it comical and he said ‘I’m going to be older than you’ about five years ago.”
On the off years, she added, the Leavitt family tends to celebrate her life on the 28th of February.
“But we celebrate every four years a whole lot bigger than the other years… we go from the 21st to 29th-- we have four birthdays within a week,” Leavitt added. “The funny thing is even the DMV sometimes doesn’t recognize my birthday. About eight years ago, I had to convince someone there when I got my license renewed. I had to convince them it was a real date… So many people don’t know that we’re leaplings.”
Janelle Patterson can be reached at jpatterson@mariettatimes.com.
At a glance:
• There have been 107 leap years between 1582 and 2020.
• The next leap day will add a 29th day to February in 2024.
• Individuals born on Leap Day are called Leaplings.
Source: Times research.