New-York tribune., 1900-12-23
THE END OF THE CENTURY.
ANOTHER ATTEMPT TO MAKE IT'S TIME
OF CLOSING CLEAR.
SPREAD OF THE QUESTION TO DECADES
THE FALIIBILITY OF ENCYCLOPEDIAS.
Freeborn, Mimi, Dec. - ~"

Freeborn, Minn Dec. ls, 1900
To the Editor of The Tribune
Sir have read the article in 1T The s centEy
when IT begins read the arteie 'ntousH hous tha
5eeades-when they begin. 1 have been entangleG
in some disputes about that, and wanted 10 pe
@eni sss fsh en- that soec isf have plenty
ents defendng the e theGry te lnat areSments have
have been on that side These writer's go, al
j have read all have seen on the subject with
interest. because want TO be convinced, SO as 70
be with the majority am 10th 10 ieeI that an @ tne
learned men IN the country are re against % ssrns neobe
IS obtuse TO understand reasons that are PLAIN
toned above says the question in regard 10 the be-
ginning OF the century Is settled Ine of
learning and prominence has aeq1lesced IN tne sel
pfsdent renhel Of Wellesley Goege We'll When do the
decades begin? Is that question settled! III II SO SO,
wait till January 1901? What years are com
for instance do we mean the years 9eHMeH IS9 s%g
and 1870 or the years between 1861 ana lsd! ana
wears 1870 and 1850 or between the years ls7l and
1881. and on? II seems TO an unIearned man
OF that useless and perpiexng figure in our reck,
1nine sn3 s1e 6sge ang I so Of the Centuries From
1890 TO 1900 should include century, even and
square. and that without using the word inclusive
That would be the natural common-sense way 10
do. To put a l every time is unnatural and
Nov / am not a learned did attend
ssh0o bs WIEN WAS Doy away @ 9p few m o terms The
district is almost depopulated, and the site OF
That is the highest school ever attended IN any
sense Of the word. ] got but little OF I'm tnat
comes TO learned things. ] am not in it. can un-
understand how the hundredth dollar is needed to
pay the 500 debt and how the nineteen cen hqndTedtn
dollar would be needed TO pay the 81 goo dept put
can't see why, If we are reckoning from the blrth
the age OF that person. Assuming that Jesus Christ
was born January l. at tho beginning Of the Chris.
had lived till January l. 1900 He would have been
1870 d on n at ia dy M dee T0gq bss d hase so SO
in my thick skull that find il hard to get it
merais Christ wasn't a year old when He was born.
can't why we should not reckon the years of
get 70 be one hundred years old am going TO say
the very first dag OF that year. | am not going
that am a century old. And when I get to be two
f 1t on So the am Ty go&g & 70 y S of ha
At the age Of 1900 am going TO declare that nave
day longer IL shall count on the twentieth century
behind time every Of these centennial pc
Row the author of the article we are considering,
Sam Hill that means-says there never was was a year ear
o. nobody ever heard of anything happening IN me
year 0. and that such an idea is an unaccountabe
thing Well, perhaps, such an idea is an absurdity,
but Il seems to me II would be a mighty sight
handler have such year than ii is 10 try to
lime which includes years before Christ with years
afterward you have straight work For INSTANCE ;ta
same time of the year 4. D.. if you had a zero
year you could simply add the two dates together
and you would have the age of the child If there
Is no zero year there. then instead of the child
being ten years old at death it would have been
only nine. II history has failed to recognize that
then history has made mistake. II is just little
OF Chambers's Encyclopaedia says that Augustus
Caesar September %. in the year 63 B. C,
and that he died August 19, in the year Il A. D.,
and that he in the seventy-seventh year OF his
Lge II there is a year at the commencement
of the Christian Chambers's Encyclopaedia is
right; IL there is no zero year then Chambers's
Encyclopaedia is wrong. Augustus Cesar was not
almost seventy-seven years old; he lacked month
of being seventy-six years old.
the old almanacs the hour between II and
was represented by an O. Half past twelve put
o.30. I asked my father once what sense there
in having hour represented by a cipher. He
said il because the first hour yet
pleted. Why II should be any more absurd to have
a zero year than il is TO have zero hour don't
understand. Ny ideas may very foolish to the
learned. but there good plain. blunt
men. tillers Of the soil like myself that think
century ought 10 begin with the new figures
il would be less confusing and whatever the
scholars may say about our observation-disclosures we
think it would be in accordance with good
sound horse sense to have it so. For am ex-