A black cat.Photo: Getty
Fear ye, oh fear ye, it’s Friday the 13th.
Before it was known for being a string of films about a disgruntled hockey player, Friday the 13th was known as a day of terror. But why exactly? Well, apparently no one really knows. But it’s been around long enough that we’ve accrueda lot of factsabout it.
Some historians date 13-related bad luck to dinner parties
For one, the Last Supper: There were 13 people (12 apostles, one Jesus) at that dinner? And two of them (Jesus and Judas) didn’t … have the best time afterward?
Also, Jesus was crucified on a Friday, which may be where Friday and 13 dovetailed in the realm of superstition, Michael Bailey, a history professor at Iowa State University,toldUSA Today.
Hammurabi was anti-13
“Paraskevidekatriaphobia” is the official name for a fear of Friday the 13th
In 2013, Donald Dossey, a folklore historian and founder of the Stress Management Center and Phobia Institute in Asheville, North Carolina,estimatedthat “$800 or $900 million is lost in business on [Friday the 13th] because people will not fly or do business they normally would.”
However, there was, at one point, a pro-13 club
It was called, unsurprisingly, the Thirteen Club, and its stated mission was to improve the standing of the holiday and also flout all manner of superstitions. At its first meeting, all 13 members walked under ladders into a room filled with spilled salt. The group’s ranks swelled to 400 eventually, taking in five U.S. Presidents: Chester Arthur, Grover Cleveland, Benjamin Harrison, William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt.
That legend about buildings not having a 13th floor is true
At least in Chicago. “There is no 13th floor here – it goes from 12 to 14,” a front-desk employee at the city’s 100-plus-year-old Hotel BurnhamtoldThe Huffington Postin 2015. “People don’t really notice it; I think it’s standard practice in Chicago. Honestly, I don’t think I’ve seen a 13th floor [in the city].”
Taylor Swift.
It’s not unlucky forTaylor Swift
HerEras Tourmovie is even coming out this Friday the 13th, 2023!
There’s no getting away from it
In the Gregorian calendar, there will always be at least one Friday the 13th … so you know when it’s coming.
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Statistically speaking, it’s actually safer than most days
Whether this is because people are staying at home, fearfully tucked in bed, seems unlikely, but the Dutch Centre for Insurance Statisticsconducted a study in 2008that showed there were fewer traffic accidents, fires and robberies on Friday the 13th, compared to other Fridays.
But it is a bad day to be a black cat
Black cats already have a rough life, but they get it especially bad on Friday the 13th. So that was why, starting on October 13, 1939,theNew York Timesreportedthat French Lick Springs, Indiana, enacted a law that all black cats in the area would wear bells “as a war measure to alleviate mental strain on the populace” and presumably make the cats easier to avoid.
source: people.com
