NEW CALENDAR

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 74, Issue 148, 25 June 1931, Page 11

NEW CALENDAR

PROPOSAL FOR 1934. THIRTEEN MONTHS IN YEAR. LEAGUE OF NATIONS’ PLAN. The most revolutionary change since the institution of summer time in the everyday lives of the world’s peoples has been planned to take place on January 1, 1934. A new calendar, which will regulate our activities in every branch of business and social existence, has been drawn up, and preparations for its introduction have been going on quietly for a long time in all countries. There is soon to be a special conference of experts of the League of Nations in Geneva, when a decision is practically certain to be taken in favour of “rationalising” the calendar year. The suggestion is that the new calendar should begin on January 1, 1934. The expert committee of the league consider that sufficient time will have elapsed before January, 1934, for each country to obtain the necessary parliamentary endorsement for the amendment. Every month under the new scheme will comprise twenty-eight days, and there will bo thirteen months in a year. An entirely new month its name is not yet chosen, but “Sol” is recommended—is to be interposed between June and July. The days of the week will fall always on exactly the same dates in each month, each month commencing on a Sunday, and ending on a Saturday. After 1934 it should be possible, says a London newspaper, always to find out the date by thinking of the day, or the day by remembering the date. Church festivals would fall on fixed dates. Easter Day, for example, would be always on Sunday, April 15, and Christmas Day would be observed always on Monday, December 23. Leaders of the Protestant Churches are sympathetically disposed toward the fixing of Christian religious festivals. So also is the Greek Church, and it is anticipated that the Roman Catholic Church will fall into line. Two international holidays will have to be introduced into the simplified calendar. The 365th. day of each year will not belong to December at all. It will, if the proposal is approved, bo named “Year Day,” and will be observed as a holiday in all countries. Similarly, in the leap years the extra day will bo placed at the end jf June, and will be named “Leap Day.” It will have no date, and it, too, will be a holiday. The writer says: “Support from prominent business men throughout the world has been collected by tho League of Nations Committee in favour of the calendar change. Governments are united in favour of it. So strong is the League of Nations for the change that every one should prepare their minds for the New Calendar on January 1, 1934.”