Friday the 13th

Up to the end of 2015, there have been 95 Friday the 13ths since the start of 1961:

1. Friday 13 January 1961
2. Friday 13 October 1961
3. Friday 13 April 1962
4. Friday 13 July 1962
5. Friday 13 September 1963
6. Friday 13 December 1963
7. Friday 13 March 1964
8. Friday 13 November 1964
9. Friday 13 August 1965
10. Friday 13 May 1966
11. Friday 13 January 1967
12. Friday 13 October 1967
13. Friday 13 September 1968
14. Friday 13 December 1968
15. Friday 13 June 1969
16. Friday 13 February 1970
17. Friday 13 March 1970
18. Friday 13 November 1970
19. Friday 13 August 1971
20. Friday 13 October 1972
21. Friday 13 April 1973
22. Friday 13 July 1973
23. Friday 13 September 1974
24. Friday 13 December 1974
25. Friday 13 June 1975
26. Friday 13 February 1976
27. Friday 13 August 1976
28. Friday 13 May 1977
29. Friday 13 January 1978
30. Friday 13 October 1978
31. Friday 13 April 1979
32. Friday 13 July 1979
33. Friday 13 June 1980
34. Friday 13 February 1981
35. Friday 13 March 1981
36. Friday 13 November 1981
37. Friday 13 August 1982
38. Friday 13 May 1983
39. Friday 13 January 1984
40. Friday 13 April 1984
41. Friday 13 July 1984
42. Friday 13 September 1985
43. Friday 13 December 1985
44. Friday 13 June 1986
45. Friday 13 February 1987
46. Friday 13 March 1987
47. Friday 13 November 1987
48. Friday 13 May 1988
49. Friday 13 January 1989
50. Friday 13 October 1989
51. Friday 13 April 1990
52. Friday 13 July 1990
53. Friday 13 September 1991
54. Friday 13 December 1991
55. Friday 13 March 1992
56. Friday 13 November 1992
57. Friday 13 August 1993
58. Friday 13 May 1994
59. Friday 13 January 1995
60. Friday 13 October 1995
61. Friday 13 September 1996
62. Friday 13 December 1996
63. Friday 13 June 1997
64. Friday 13 February 1998
65. Friday 13 March 1998
66. Friday 13 November 1998
67. Friday 13 August 1999
68. Friday 13 October 2000
69. Friday 13 April 2001
70. Friday 13 July 2001
71. Friday 13 September 2002
72. Friday 13 December 2002
73. Friday 13 June 2003
74. Friday 13 February 2004
75. Friday 13 August 2004
76. Friday 13 May 2005
77. Friday 13 January 2006
78. Friday 13 October 2006
79. Friday 13 April 2007
80. Friday 13 July 2007
81. Friday 13 June 2008
82. Friday 13 February 2009
83. Friday 13 March 2009
84. Friday 13 November 2009
85. Friday 13 August 2010
86. Friday 13 May 2011
87. Friday 13 January 2012
88. Friday 13 April 2012
89. Friday 13 July 2012
90. Friday 13 September 2013
91. Friday 13 December 2013
92. Friday 13 June 2014
93. Friday 13 February 2015
94. Friday 13 March 2015
95. Friday 13 November 2015

While I'm not especially superstitious, Friday the 13th has certainly held bad luck for some people. Here are a few of my favorite coincidences:

• An author’s ship suffered a strange fate. Author Thomas William Lawson was a businessman and author, and he might have helped popularize the Friday the 13th superstition. In 1907, he wrote Friday, the Thirteenth, a popular novel about a stock broker who brings down the markets on the eponymous date.
  Lawson also invested heavily in a schooner named after him, the Thomas W. Lawson. The ship was wrecked off the Isles of Scilly in the early hours of Saturday, Dec. 14th, 1907. Lawson lived in Boston at the time, so to him, the boat wrecked on Friday the 13th.
• Stock markets crashed. On Oct. 13, 1989, traders saw one of the worst stock market crashes in years. It was triggered by fears of high inflation and news of a failed United Airlines buyout. The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 189 points, indicating a major panic among investors.
  The timing of the panic wasn’t ideal; stock traders are notoriously superstitious, and investors often avoid making major trades on Friday the 13th.
• The Knights Templar were arrested and executed. The Knights Templar were a religious order formed in the 12th century to protect Christians during the Crusades. In 1307, French king Philip IV had built up a sizable debt to the secret order, who were extremely wealthy by that point in time. Philip had scores of them arrested on Friday, Oct. 13, 1307. Many were tortured and eventually burned at the stake.
  Some believe this is the origin of our modern Friday the 13th superstition, but there are quite a few other explanations for the paranoia surrounding the date.
• In 1829, a prominent daredevil attempted an ill-fated stunt. Sam Patch attempted to jump from a 25-foot-tall platform above Genesee Falls in Rochester, New York, on Friday, Nov. 13, 1829. In total, the jump was 125 feet. He’d survived similar jumps in the past, but alas, he wasn’t so lucky on this attempt.
  His final words:
  “Napoleon was a great man and a great general. He conquered armies and he conquered nations. But he couldn’t jump the Genesee Falls. Wellington was a great man and a great soldier. He conquered armies and he conquered Napoleon, but he couldn’t jump the Genesee Falls. That was left for me to do, and I can do it and will!”
  He couldn’t, and he didn’t. His body was found several months later.
• In 2010, a 13-year-old in Suffolk, England, was struck by lightning (and it gets weirder). The boy was rushed to a hospital and was expected to make a full recovery.
  "This was a very minor burn to the boy's shoulder, but he was conveyed to hospital and is recovering well,” a county ambulance officer said at the time.
  Here’s the bizarre part of the story: The child suffered his injuries at precisely 1:13 in the afternoon—or 13:13, if you’re using a 24-hour clock. We’re guessing he stayed indoors for the next Friday the 13th.
• On Friday, April 13, 2029, asteroid 99942 Apophis will pass near Earth. Scientists initially believed it had a chance of crashing into our planet, causing massive destruction (but not a mass extinction, as the asteroid’s not especially large). They’ve since ruled out that possibility. Still, the idea of a near-Earth asteroid passing by on the unluckiest date on the calendar has prompted fears of an apocalypse. Here’s why there’s nothing to worry about.

If these coincidences seem frightening, you could always stay in bed on Friday the 13th.

The convergence of two superstitions between the number 13 and Friday seem to be at the heart of many questions concerning this particular superstition. So lets start with those.

FRIDAY has been an inauspicious day for a very long time, and in many varied cultures. It has been held to be both unlucky and as a day when evil influences are at work.

In Ancient Rome, Friday was execution day.

In some pre-Christian Religions Friday was a day of worship, so those who involved themselves in secular or self-interested activities on that day were not likely to receive the blessings of the gods on their undertakings. Which may go a long way to explain the superstition of not embarking on journeys or starting important projects on Fridays.

From the Christian bible:

- Friday is reputed to be the day Eve gave Adam the apple.

- It is said to be the day Adam & Eve were expelled from the Garden of Eden.

- Friday is also reputed to be the day they (Adam & Eve) died.

- The Great Flood is supposed to have started on a Friday.

- God was said to have struck the builders of the Towel of Babel and created the confusion of many tongues, on a Friday.

- The Temple of Solomon was destroyed on a Friday.

- Christ was crucified and died on a Friday.

In Britain, Friday was customarily Hanging Day.

It is said accidents are more common on Fridays, however, that may be more because Friday is the end of the work week and people are hurrying to get away from work, than any sinister reasons.

It is supposed that witches favour Friday for coven gatherings. This Pagan association was not lost on the early Christian Church, which went to considerable lengths to suppress them. If Friday was a holy day for "heathens" the Church fathers felt it must not be so for Christians, hence in the middle ages Friday became known as the "Witches' Sabbath."

The name "Friday" is derived from the Norse goddess known either as Frigg - wife of Odin (the goddess of marriage & fertility, the moon & witches) or Freya (goddess of love, beauty, sensuality, war, good fortune, magic & wisdom). To complicate matters the two goddesses are combined and used interchangeably by many, however, the etymology of Fridayhas been given both ways.

Pre-Christian Teutonic people actually considered Fridayto be lucky, particularly for wedding, because of its association with the aforementioned goddesses. This however changed when the Christian church came into ascendancy. Frigg/Freya was re-cast in folklore as a witch and her day became associated with evil doings.

Various legends developed in that vein, one however, is of particular interest:

As the legend goes, the witches of the north used to observe their Sabbath by gathering in a cemetery in the dark of the moon. On one such occasion the Friday goddess, (Freya herself) came down from her sanctuary in the mountaintops and appeared before the group, who numbered only twelve at the time, and gave them one of her cats, after which the witches' coven, and, by "tradition," every properly-formed coven since, is comprised of thirteen members.

Other superstitions concerning Friday include:

- Clothing made on a Friday will never fit properly.

- Visiting your doctor on Friday will not have a good result.

- Never change your bed on a Friday, as it will result in nightmares and bad dreams.

- One should not move their residence or marry on a Friday, if they expect any good to come of it.

- Cut your nails of Friday and you cut them for sorrow.

- Ill news received on a Friday will etch wrinkles in the face of the recipient, more so than the same news received on any other day.

- Friday is an inauspicious day to start a trip as "misfortune will bound to follow."

- Ships that set sail on Friday will have bad luck. ~ This superstition is supported by the Urban legend of the H.M.S. Friday.

It is reported that, in an attempt to debunk the many sailors' superstitions centered around Fridays, the British government commissioned a special ship. They named it the H.M.S. Friday; the crew was selected on a Friday, the keel was set on a Friday, and she was launched on a Friday. They even went so far as to hire a man named Friday to captain her. It was on a Friday that she set sail on her maiden voyage, and as the story goes, was never heard of again.

Children born on Fridays are believed by some to be unlucky, but they will enjoy the gifts of second sight and healing powers.

On the other side of things, the old nursery rhyme says "Friday's child is loving and giving", so not all cultures agreed that Friday was a bad day to be born.

An old proverb said "If you laugh on Friday you will cry on Sunday,"

There are those who say the weather on Friday will be repeated on Sunday.

The number THIRTEEN is much maligned, The prejudice against the number is more or less planet wide. The Turks are said to have so disliked the number so much that it was all but eradicated from their vocabulary. In fact there are so many people with a fear (triskaidekaphobia) of the number thirteen, that many will go to great lengths to avoid any association with it. This is why there are cities that do not have a thirteenthStreet or Avenue, highways often do not have a thirteenthexit, many airports do not have a thirteenth gate and many buildings do not have rooms and in some cases floors number thirteen.

The number thirteen is associated with the supposed number of members in a witches' coven. As the legend goes, the witches of the north used to observe their Sabbath by gathering in a cemetery in the dark of the moon. On one such occasion the Friday goddess, (Freya herself) came down from her sanctuary in the mountaintops and appeared before the group, who numbered only twelve at the time, and gave them one of her cats, after which the witches' coven, and, by "tradition," every properly-formed coven since, is comprised of thirteen members.

It is also interesting to note in this story, the possible origin of the belief that a witch's familiar is a cat.

One of the most commonly known and observed superstitions concerning the number thirteen, has to do with dining. It is said to be incredibly unlucky to be invited to dinner and have thirteen people at table.

The belief is that the first person to rise from table and/or the last person to sit down at the table are destined to die within the calendar year. The only way to avoid this is for everyone to be seated and to rise from the table at the same time. Not an easy feat, however, there is some hope for everyone's survival if two or more of the people at dinner are seated at another/separate table.

- This superstition is said to originate with the Last Supper at which Judas Iscariot was the last person to take a seat at table.

- The superstition is also said to have originated in the East with the Hindus, who believed, for their own reasons, that it is always unlucky for thirteen people to gather in one place at one time, say - at dinner.

- Interestingly enough, precisely the same superstition has been attributed to the ancient Vikings. There is an old Norse legend that seems tailor made for continuing this trend;

As the story goes, twelve gods were invited to a banquet at Valhalla. Loki, the Evil One, (god of mischief) had been left off the guest list but crashed the party, bringing the total number of attendees to thirteen. True to character, Loki incited Hod (the blind god of darkness and winter) into attacking Balder the Good (fairest of the gods). Hod took a spear of mistletoe offered by Loki and obediently hurled it at Balder, killing him instantly. All Valhalla grieved.

This tale apparently explains why the Norse themselves adhere to the belief that thirteen people at a dinner party is just plain bad luck.

One of the more perplexing suggestions of origin is that the fears surrounding the number thirteen are as ancient as the act of counting. This speculative explanation suggests, primitive man had only his ten fingers and two feet to represent units, so he could count no higher than twelve. What lay beyond that -thirteen- was an unfathomable mystery to our prehistoric antecedents, hence an object of fear, confusion and superstition. Which has the feel of possible truth, but my first thought was, those self-same humans didn't wear shoes, so why didn't they use their toes to count with as well?

There is also a theory which has a ring of truth to it that suggests that the number thirteen may have been purposely vilified by the founders of patriarchal religions in the early days of western civilization because it represented femininity.

Thirteen had been revered in prehistoric goddess-worshiping cultures, we are told, because it corresponded to the number of lunar (and coincidentally, menstrual) cycles in a year (13 x 28 = 364 days).

The "Earth Mother of Laussel," for example, a 27,000 year old carving found near the Lascaux caves in France is often cited as an icon of matriarchal spirituality. It depicts a female figure holding a crescent-shaped horn bearing thirteen notches.

It is speculated that as the solar calendar triumphed over the lunar with the rise of male-dominated civilization and religions, so did the "perfect" number 12 over the "imperfect" number 13, thereafter considered anathema.

It is said that if you have thirteen letters in your name you will have the "Devil's luck." There may be some truth in that as Jack the Ripper, Charles Manson, Jeffrey Dahmer, Theodore Bundy and Albert De Salvo all had thirteen letters in their names.

More superstitions about the number thirteen include:

- There are thirteen steps leading to the gallows.

- There are thirteen knots in a hangman's noose.

- It is thirteen feet the blade of a guillotine falls.

- There were thirteen people at the last supper.

- Lizzy Borden was said to have spoken only thirteenwords at her trial.

- There were thirteen original colonies.

- The US Seal has thirteen stars, bars, and feathers in the eagle's tail. The eagle carries thirteen bars in one claw, thirteen olive branches in the other.

- E pluribus Unum has thirteen letters.

- Ancient Romans regarded the number thirteen as a symbol of death, destruction and misfortune.

- The thirteenth card in a Tarot deck is "Death" often pictured as the Grim Reaper (a skeleton, often in a hooded cape, carrying a scythe). It should be noted however, that the Death card is rarely if ever read as "death" but as transition, change or new beginnings.

- The driver of Princess Diana's vehicle hit pillar #13at Place de l'Alma when she was killed in Paris, France.

- Apollo 13. In 1970, the thirteenth mission was to be launched from pad #39 (13 x 3). The mission was aborted, after an explosion occurred in the fuel cell of their service module. The rocket had left launching pad at 13:13 CST and the date was April 13th.

.- In France, a "quatrorzieme" is a professional 14th guest hired by people who had only thirteen guests in attendance for dinner, and who felt that was unlucky.

- A baker's dozen is a term used to describe bakery items such as rolls, or doughnuts sold in a pack of thirteen. I have heard many explanations for this, however, the following is pretty much exemplary of them.

The story tells of a witch near Albany, NY who demanded thirteen items every time she came in to a particular bakery. One day the old bake, who could not afford her extra biscuit, refused her. She is said to have sneered some strange words at the man, and thereafter he suffered terrible luck, until he brought her another thirteen rolls. After that life was once again easy for the baker and word spread around town. The custom is still sometimes practiced today.

The prejudice against the number thirteen is of obscure and ancient origin, as it existed in Roman times long before Christ, and the last supper.

Perhaps of interest, is that the Chinese consider thirteen to be a lucky number.

The ancient Egyptians revered thirteen was the number of the last step a soul took on its journey to eternity, twelve steps taken in life and the final one at death into the eternal glory of the afterlife. Thus making the thirteenth step a joyous one. It is only after the Civilizations of the Pharaohs were ancient history that the association of the number thirteen with death became one of fear instead of one of celebration.

There are some schools of thought that attribute the thirteenth step into the afterlife to be of Hindu origins.

FRIDAY the THIRTEENTH is believed to be the most widespread superstition.

There isn't much documentation prior to the nineteenth century, on why humankind decided to amalgamate the two superstitions, other than the obvious one, in that the thirteenth of a month falls on a Friday between one and three times a year and someone was bound to eventually put two and two, or in this case thirteen and Friday into one day with a really nasty reputation.

The earliest traceable reference to the combination is from the biography of Italian composer Gioachino Rossini. In the book The Life of Rossini, by Henry Sutherland Edwards, it says: "[Rossini] was surrounded to the last by admiring and affectionate friends; and if it be true that, like so many other Italians, he regarded Friday as an unlucky day, and thirteen as an unlucky number, it is remarkable that on Friday, the 13th of November, he died."

There is a theory that notes references to the superstition are nonexistent prior to 1907, and argues that the Thomas Lawson novel Friday the 13th is what has given rise to the popularity of the superstition. The book, all but forgotten now, concerned dirty dealings in the stock market and sold quite well in its day. It seems unlikely that the novelist, literally invented that premise himself. He treats it within the story, in fact, as a notion that already existed in the public consciousness. This may have set it on a path to becoming the most widespread superstition in modern times, it certainly was readily adopted and popularized by the press.

There is evidence to show that although most people will claim not to be superstitious, businesses, worldwide, show a marked decline in sales etc. on Fridays the thirteenth, as many choose to put off business decisions, investments of money, business and personal travel and even personal events such as weddings. Many others choose not to go in to work, eat in restaurants, go to movies, theatrical performances or to entertain in their homes on that day.

It has been known for the departure of certain ocean liners to be delayed until after midnight to appease passengers' fears of setting sail on a Friday the 13th.

According to Dr Donald Dossey, a psychotherapist specializing in the treatment of phobias (and the man who coined the term paraskevidekatriaphobia, sometimes spelled paraskavedekatriaphobia), there may be as many as 21 million people in the United States that currently suffer from some form of the phobia. If he is right, eight percent of Americans are still in the grips of a very old superstition.

There has been research in Britain showing there are fewer cars on the road on a Friday 13th than on any other Friday, and yet there are more accidents reported.

Friday, January the 13th 1939 is one example people hold up for the belief the day is inauspicious. In Australia, on that day, a devastating bushfire swept across southern Victoria, killing 71 people.

Another supposed origin of the Friday the 13th superstition comes from the historical destruction of the Knights Templar.

The Dan Brown novel The Da Vinci Code and the Movie of the same name, (directed by Ron Howard and starring Tom Hanks) popularized the thought that the superstition is tied to the mass arrest of the Knights Templar. Secretly ordered by King Philip of France, (and Holy Roman Emperor, Pope Clement V) the mass arrest, of all the Knights Templar in France happened on Friday, October 13, 1307. The eventual condemnation, and eradication of the Knights Templar was to follow. The King of France and the Pope got the spoils, and a date was cemented in time.

Very nearly everyone you ask has a theory about the origin of the Friday the thirteenth superstition, and no few of them will happily share some frightening or apocryphal story to back it up. And in all honesty most of us enjoy a good "scary tale," as evidenced by the popularity of the series of movies titled "Friday 13th" 1 through 705 (okay, I will admit that may be a bit of an exaggeration)