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Leap Year Only Flitch Day

July 9, 2025/0 Comments/in July

July 9, 2025: Flitch Day awards a side of bacon to a couple still in love after a year and a day of marriage. It is only celebrated every leap year, so the next one will take place in 2028. Here’s the post for last year, which was a momentous occasion.

Flitch bearers, 2016

July 9, 2024: Today is Flitch Day, a custom dating back to 1104 in a village in Essex, England.

First, a little background is in order. A flitch is half a pig, cut lengthwise, salted and cured, also known as a full side of bacon. The story goes that a year and a day after their nuptials, Lord Reginald Fitzwater and his wife disguised themselves as peasants and traveled to the local monastery to beg blessings for their happy marriage.

The monk who received them was so impressed by their devotion that he gave them a flitch. In what could be called the first episode of Undercover Boss, Lord Fitzwater revealed his identity and promised his land to the monastery. He had one condition: the monks must award a flitch to any couple who could prove their love after a year and a day. (Who better to judge marital bliss than men who’ve taken a vow of chastity?)

The word of the tradition, known as the Dunmow Flitch Trials, spread. Author William Langland referred to it in his 1362 book, The Vision of Piers Plowman. In the early 15th century, Geoffrey Chaucer alluded to it in The Canterbury Tales.

Records weren’t kept until 1445, when Richard Wright of Norwich was victorious, according to documents preserved in the British Museum. One hundred years later, King Henry VIII closed the monasteries, but the trials endured, overseen by the current Lord of the Manor.

In 1832, George Wade, Steward of Little Dunmow, declared the contest “an idle custom bringing people of indifferent character into the neighborhood.” The Dunmow Flitch Trials declined in popularity and eventually lapsed entirely.

The custom was revived following the success of Harrison Ainsworth’s novel, The Flitch or The Custom of Dunmow, published in 1854. In it, he told the tale of a man so desperate to win the flitch that he married a succession of wives to find his perfect match.

Dunmow Flitch Trial winners, 2024

The event has been held in Great Dunmow ever since. After World War II, it was decided that the trials would only take place in leap years. Luckily, 2024 is such a year. This year’s celebration is especially important because Emma Hynds and Emma D’Costa, who have been married for under two years, have become the first same-sex couple to win the flitch. The rest of us have four more years to perfect our marriages. Or we could just buy a side of bacon and call it a day.

Did the phrase “bring home the bacon” originate with this contest? Though many believe so, we may never be certain. By the way, losers aren’t sent home empty-handed. They receive a consolation prize of gammon, the hind leg of a pig. The one thing we know for sure is that this is no fun for the pigs.

Happy Flitch Day!

July 8 is the Soapy Smith Wake

July 8, 2025/0 Comments/in July

Today is the 43rd annual Soapy Smith Wake. Since 1974, descendants of con man Jefferson “Soapy” Smith have held an annual wake for him on the anniversary of his murder in Skagway, Alaska, on July 8, 1898.

Soapy Smith, image at legendsofamerica

Jefferson Smith lived to prove the axiom, “A fool and his money are soon parted.” He gained his nickname due to his prize soap scam, in which he’d set up a display of soaps, make a show of placing bills from one to one hundred dollars around several bars, wrap them to resemble the other bars, then appear to hide them in the stack.

A shill he’d plant in the crowd would pay a dollar, unwrap a seemingly random soap, pull out a bill, and start shouting about his winnings. This convinced others to clamor to buy the other bars. There were no more winners. Smith had used sleight of hand of hand to conceal the fact that he had not put the money-wrapped bars in the pile. Halfway through, he announced the hundred-dollar bill hadn’t yet been found and auctioned off the remainder.

At some point in Smith’s mostly successful twenty-year career, Smith was arrested for running the prize soap racket. The police officer forgot Smith’s first name and wrote “Soapy Smith” in his logbook. The name stuck.

Smith’s luck came to an end on July 8, 1898, after his crew bilked a miner out of a sack of gold in a crooked game of three-card monte. Four men, including vigilante Frank H. Reid, confronted Smith, who refused to return the gold or turn over his associates. In the ensuing gunfight, Smith and Reid exchanged fire. Smith was shot through the heart and died instantly; Reid, shot in the groin, died twelve days later of his injuries.

Soapy Smith, dead, image at legendsofamerica

Soapy Smith was buried several yards outside the Skagway city cemetery. Over the years, his reputation grew to that of a Klondike-style Robin Hood, fleecing the rich to give to the poor. There’s no evidence he did anything but line his own pockets and those of the public servants and businessmen he bribed.

Reid was painted as a villain who murdered Smith. If we assume the two men shot each other—and there are those who question that—then Smith must have shot Reid first, since he couldn’t have fired after being shot through the heart. Unless the gun went off as he was falling, but then we’re getting into grassy knoll territory.

On July 8, 1974, members of Smith’s family and their friends began the tradition of holding a wake at his gravesite, toasting him with several bottles of champagne. When the group felt nature calling, they started another tradition by entering the cemetery proper and relieving themselves on Frank H. Reid’s grave.

A reporter present at the wake dubbed it the “sprinkling of Frank.” The Smiths and many residents found it humorous at the time. The family continued to furnish champagne for years until the wake was finally banned from the cemetery and moved to the Eagles Hall in downtown Skagway.

If you can’t make it to Skagway to celebrate, The Magic Castle in Hollywood, California, has held a Soapy Smith Party every year since 2004. No matter where you are, raise a glass, if you like, and toast the cantankerous, thieving criminal known as Soapy Smith. And if you have to pee, please use a restroom.

Nettie Stevens Day

July 7, 2025/0 Comments/in July

Nettie Stevens

Nettie Stevens Day celebrates the scientist who discovered XX and XY chromosomes determine sex. But few know of her contributions because the credit went to a man — who got it wrong.

Nettie Stevens studied mealworms and found that a male’s sperm carried both X and Y chromosomes, while a female’s eggs contained only X chromosomes. She concluded that sex determination must come from fertilization of the egg by the sperm. In 1905, she submitted a paper for publication, reporting her results.

Meanwhile, Columbia University scientist Edmund Beecher Wilson had reached the same conclusion, sort of. He was asked to review Stevens’ paper prior to its publication; his own paper had reportedly already gone to press, negating any possibility of dishonesty.

Historian Stephen Brush disputes the timeline in The History of Science Society: “It is generally stated that E. B. Wilson obtained the same results as Stevens, at the same time,” he writes. But “Wilson probably did not arrive at his conclusion on sex determination until after he had seen Stevens’ results.”

In fact, Wilson wrongly asserted that environmental factors could influence sex. Stevens insisted it was all due to chromosomes. At the time, there was no way to prove either theory. However, it has been known for decades that Stevens got it right. That should render the question of who published first irrelevant.

In spite of that, Wilson and Stevens were credited with making the fully correct discovery independently. Wilson received the lion’s share of accolades while Stevens was often mistakenly referred to as a “lab technician.” Brush states, “Because of Wilson’s more substantial contributions in other areas, he tends to be given most of the credit for this discovery.”

The fact that Nettie Stevens had two X chromosomes certainly contributed to the lack of recognition. Her own accomplishments refute Brush’s assertion. She published 40 papers and was about to attain full research status at Bryn Mawr when she died of breast cancer on May 4, 1912, at the age of 50.

She — and Wilson, too — have been all but forgotten since then. In 1933, fellow scientist Thomas H. Morgan received the Nobel Prize for his pioneering work in chromosomal research, even though he didn’t espouse the theory until years after Stevens and Wilson had published their papers.

Stevens once remarked to her students that their questions were always welcome “so long as I keep my enthusiasm for biology; and that, I hope, will be as long as I live.”

Let’s remember Nettie Stevens today. And tomorrow and the next day….

July 6 is Umbrella Cover Day

July 6, 2025/0 Comments/in July

Today is Umbrella Cover Day. Although the holiday got its start in 2014, its roots reach back to 1996, when Maine native Nancy 3. Hoffman founded the Umbrella Cover Museum, with the motto “Celebrate the Mundane,” dedicating it to “finding wonder and beauty in the simplest of things.”

Hoffman changed her middle name from Arlene to Three in 1992 after a typographical error on a form gave her the idea; she likes that “3” is universal to every language and needs no translation. She heads up an accordion band known as The Maine Squeeze. Her one-woman performance of “The Mikado” by Gilbert and Sullivan was once produced at Scotland’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

Many years ago, Hoffman explained her inspiration for the museum in her book Uncovered and Exposed:

I was cleaning out my house one day, and discovered that I still had all of the covers from all the umbrellas I’d ever bought (Seven or so.) That got me thinking. Then one day, around 1992, I was in a dime store and I stole a cover off of an umbrella…just the cover. Then I knew I was hooked. After that I started planning the Museum and soliciting donations for the exhibits.

In 1996, the Umbrella Cover Museum opened its doors — more specifically, the door to her kitchen, where the covers were displayed. Eventually, the collection grew so large that she moved it to its current two-room location on Peaks Island, Maine.

The museum is open during the summer months. (Hoffman winters in Key West, Florida.) Guided tours are available. The curator/director serenades lucky visitors with her rendition of “Let a Smile Be Your Umbrella” while accompanying herself on accordion.

For several years, Hoffman petitioned the Guinness Book of World Records to add a new category for umbrella sleeves. Guinness finally acquiesced, scheduling an official count on July 7, 2012. News of the upcoming event brought donations from around the world.

By the day of the event, the museum housed covers hailing from forty-eight countries. According to Guinness rules, to attain a record for the highest number of an object, the total must exceed 500. Handmade covers and duplicates were not allowed in the tally. Hoffman sailed into the record books with 730. As of this writing, the museum has received over 2,000 covers from 71 countries.

Hoffman is always happy to accept umbrella covers and solicited monetary donations to fund a long-time goal to host a British “pop-up” museum. For two weeks in September 2017, she exhibited over 300 covers at “Centrespace Gallery” in central Bristol. Why? Because, Hoffman said, “Where else would umbrella covers be more appreciated than England?” (No word on whether she’ll take them to the wettest places on Earth. Or Seattle.)

On a scale from “Honey, get the pitchfork” to “She’s not hurting anyone,” Hoffman occupies the “lovable eccentric” zone. Maybe we shouldn’t need her Umbrella Cover Museum to help us find “wonder and beauty in the simplest of things,” as she puts it. But don’t we?

Happy Umbrella Cover Day!

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