A leap day birthday never gets old

While others mark their birth date every year, those born on Feb. 29 get the real thing only every four years.

[Times photo: Ron Thompson] Cheyenne Cantler of Homosassa Springs turns 4 today. She was born Feb. 29, 1996, so in a sense, today is her first birthday. Whatever birth date she celebrates, she still gets cake.

By JORGE SANCHEZ

© St. Petersburg Times, published February 29, 2000

HOMOSASSA SPRINGS -- Cheyenne Cantler is either 4 years old or 1, depending how you figure it. She was born the last Feb. 29 that we had -- four years ago.

Though she is too young to realize it, her real birthday of Feb. 29 comes around only in a leap year.

Leap years are those years divisible by four, or those that end in 00 and are divisible by 400.

There are lots of scientific reasons why this is so, but to a 4-year-old, they don't matter. Whether it's Feb. 29 or March 1, Cheyenne only knows that a birthday means opening presents and eating lots of birthday cake.

It's not easy to beat the odds and become a leap day baby. The chances of being born that day are 1 in 1,461, according to the Honor Society of Leap Day Babies.

There are about 200,000 leap day babies in the United States and about 4-million throughout the world.

What is even more remarkable is that Cheyenne almost beat even higher odds to share a leap-year birthday with her mother.

"I was born on Feb. 28," said Dawnn Allen.

Cheyenne, for the present, lives a pretty normal life. She loves going out on the Gulf of Mexico in a boat with her father, Toby Cantler, and her mom. They are both professional crabbers.

"She loves to go out with us and really enjoys feeding bait to the pelicans," Dawnn Allen said.

At home, Cheyenne plays with her brother, Mikel Allen, 11, and sisters Darlis Cantler, 7, and Tonya Allen, 14.

Leap years were invented because a year is not exactly 365 days. It actually takes the Earth 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes and a little over 45 seconds to complete its orbit around the sun.

Other famous leap day babies include Jimmy Dorsey (1904), clarinetist and bandleader, and Dinah Shore (1916), actor and singer.

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.