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New Year's Day: Jan. 1 The date of the "new year" varies from society to society. For instance, the Jewish new year, Rosh Hashanah , is celebrated in the fall, while the Chinese New Year begins on the second new moon after winter solstice (late January to mid-February). Until 1753, England and its colonies rang in the new year on March 25, which coincided with a Christian holiday called Lady Day (the Feast of the Annunciation). They made the switch to January 1 when they converted from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian. If you're making any difficult new year's resolutions this year, take heart: people have been struggling with them ever since the early Babylonians started the tradition. (Their most popular resolution was to return borrowed farm equipment, in case you were wondering.) (Back To Top) Martin Luther King, Jr. Day: third Monday in January I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. -----Martin Luther King, Jr. Born in 1929 in Atlanta, GA, Martin Luther King earned a doctorate in systematic theology from Boston University in 1955. Shortly thereafter, Dr. King was elected president of the Montgomery Improvement Association, which orchestrated the Montgomery Bus Boycott in response to Rosa Parks' arrest for refusing to give up her seat on a segregated bus. From then until his assassination on April 4, 1968, King organized marches and protests, met with leaders from around the world, and published numerous books and papers promoting equality and civil rights. In August, 1963, King gave his famous "I Have a Dream" speech. He received the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway, in December 1964. First celebrated as a national holiday on January 20, 1986, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day was created to "serve as a time for Americans to reflect on the principles of racial equality and nonviolent social change espoused by Martin Luther King, Jr." (Back To Top) Chinese New Year: (Jan. 22) 2nd new moon after winter solstice The Spring Festival, or Chinese New Year, traditionally lasts 15 days. To prepare for the coming of spring, people clean their houses, repay their debts, cut their hair, buy new clothes, and decorate their doors with vertical scrolls of characters on red paper. Large family dinners are served on New Year's Eve, and fireworks are lit at midnight to drive away evil spirits. (Back To Top) Eid ul-Adha - February 1 Eid ul-Adha is the most important Islamic feast of the year. At the end of Hajj, the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, Muslims commemorate the prophet Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his own son by sacrificing a lamb, goat, or other animal. The meat from the Feast of Sacrifice is distributed to relatives and the poor. (Back To Top) Groundhog Day: February 2 A German tradition holds that if the sun comes out on Candlemas, the hedgehog will see its shadow and six more weeks of winter will follow. When German settlers came to Pennsylvania they continued this tradition, using groundhogs instead of hedgehogs to predict the weather. The first official Groundhog Day was celebrated in 1886 in Punxsutawney, PA. (Back To Top) Valentine's Day: February 14 Despite occasional grumblings that it was invented by the greeting card industry, Valentine's Day actually has a long, rich history. Its earliest origins derive from a pagan festival called Lupercalia, in which Romans called upon the god Lupercus to keep the wolves away. As part of the festivities, Roman girls wrote their names on a slip of paper and placed them in a jar for the boys to draw from. The matches were supposed to be sweethearts until the next Lupercalia. Lupercalia evolved into Valentine's Day after Emperor Claudius II, believing married men would prefer staying with their families to fighting his wars, decreed that Roman soldiers were forbidden to wed. According to legend, a priest named Valentine conducted secret marriage ceremonies in defiance of the edict. On February 14, the eve of Lupercalia, he was beheaded for his crime. After Valentine was sanctified, Christian priests adapted the pagan holiday, moving it back a day to honor him. (Back To Top) Presidents' Day: third Monday in February First observed in 1971, Presidents' Day falls between the birthdays of Abraham Lincoln (born February 12, 1809) and George Washington (born February 22, 1732). Though created to honor all American presidents , many associate the holiday with these two famous leaders. (Back To Top) Ma'al Hijrah: 1st day of Muharram (Feb. 22) (begins sundown) Ma'al Hijrah, The Islamic New Year, commemorates the 622 A.D. Hijrah (migration) from Mecca. Faced with increasing persecution at the hands of an idolatrous populace that was unresponsive to the Prophet Muhammad's teachings, the Muslims were invited to settle in a city called Yathrib. Muhammad supervised the flight from Mecca, staying behind until the last disciple departed, then started on his journey across the desert with Abu Bakar. To evade the assassins pursuing them, the companions hid in a cave. They escaped discovery when a spider wove its web at the cave's entrance, giving the impression that no one had passed through it. Once safely in Yathrib, Muhammad built the first mosque. Islam grew and thrived in this city, renamed "Medinah," enabling the Prophet's triumphant return to Mecca years later. The Hijrah was such an important turning point for the Muslim community that they set their calendar by it. (Back To Top) Mardi Gras: day before Lent (March 4) Translated as "Fat Tuesday," Mardi Gras is historically the last chance at revelry and indulgence before the 40-day fast of Lent, which begins the following day on Ash Wednesday. Laissez les bons temps rouler! (Back To Top) Ash Wednesday: first day of Lent (March 5) Ash Wednesday marks the first day of Lent, a 40-day period of penitence. In the Roman Catholic church, a priest places burnt palm ashes from the previous Palm Sunday on the foreheads of his congregation, reciting, "Remember that you are dust, and unto dust you shall return." (Back To Top) International Women's Day: March 8 The first Women's Day took place on the last Sunday in February, 1908. Initiated by socialist women in the United States, the occasion was inspired by a number of issues -- the right to vote, equal wages, and better working conditions for female employees among them. A year later, the second International Conference of Socialist Women approved an International Women's Day, which was held for the first time in 1911. On March 8 (February 23 on the Gregorian calendar), 1917, thousands of Russian women observed this holiday by protesting food shortages, high prices, the war, and the general suffering they had endured under the Czarist regime. (The Czar was forced to abdicate four days later as a result of that and other strikes.) In 1921, March 8 became the official date for International Women's Day. No longer an exclusively socialist holiday, International Women's Day is now a time to rally support for women's rights around the world, commemorate the progress we've made, and honor the efforts of individual women who have helped bring about greater equality for all. (Back To Top) Harriet Tubman Day: March 10 "There was one or two things I had a right to, liberty and death; if I could not have one, I would have the other..." -----Harriet Tubman After her escape from slavery in 1849, Harriet Tubman (c.1820

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