S.M.F.I.H

Moses B. Cotsworth worked the books books for the British railway, and the wonky, weirdly-divided Gregorian Calendar was making his job difficult. In 1902, Cotsworth presented a design for a calendar of 13 months where every month was exactly 28 days. No more, no less. Four perfect weeks. fixed-calendar-1 Courtesy of the International Institute of Social History

This meant the dates were all standardized as well.  Regardless of the month, the 5th was a Thursday. The 1st was always a Sunday. The 10th was always a Tuesday. There would be a Friday the 13th every single month—clearly, rational railway men were not superstitious.

All the month names would stay the same and an additional 28-day month would fall between June and July. This additional month would be called “Sol,” standing for the month when the summer solstice occurs. Leap Day would be added to the end of Sol, not February, so every four years, Sol would have 29 Days.

13 months of 28 days makes for 364 days in a year. To make it 365, Cotsworth added a new holiday after December 28—”Year Day,” a floating day, not part of any month. It would be a global sabbath.

Aside from year day, all other vacations would be moved to a Monday. All holidays would be three day weekends.

Cotsworth toured the United States giving talks about his calendar’s myriad benefits, but he couldn’t find many takers. Though he did attract the interest of one of the wealthiest and most successful men of that time: George Eastman, the founder of Kodak.

Eastman took it upon himself to promote Cotsworth’s calendar design. He started a calendar league headquarters in Rochester, in Kodak’s office. There they published and printed different flyers to hand out to local businesses and actually convinced a few local business to switch to a 13 month calendar. Including, of course, Mr. Eastman’s own company,

The Eastman Kodak company adopted the 13 month calendar in 1924 and they continued to use it until 1989. The 13 month calendar was in use for 65 years.

However, within Kodak,  Eastman couldn’t fully institute the 13 month calendar in its truest form. Kodak employees didn’t observe “Sol” or “Year Day” or change every holiday to a Monday. They used it  like how some bankers work in quarters or some schools function in semesters- Kodak’s internal schedule was organized into 13 “periods”, labeled period 1 to period 13. They used the 13 month calendar as an organizational tool for planning finances and production schedules, but employees still lived their lives on the Gregorian calendar. fixed-calendar-3 Courtesy of the International Institute of Social History

George Eastman knew that if he wanted to truly standardize the calendar, Kodak couldn’t do it alone. He would have to convince the rest of the world to make the switch. Eastman and Cotsworth presented the calendar to various committees in the U.S. Congress, and calendar reform became an actual issue of debate for the League of Nations, the precursor to the U.N. At one point The League of Nations was considering 185 different calendar redesigns, and Cotsworth and Eastman’s proposal was one of a few finalists.

Even after Eastman passed away in 1932, the League of Nations continued discussing calendar redesign, but they couldn’t come to a consensus. And then, Hitler and World War II made the project of redesigning the calendar thoroughly unimportant. And then, the League of Nations folded.

We haven’t really considered calendar reform since. But there’s no reason we can’t take our vacations in Sol and celebrate Year Day.

https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/the-calendar/