I would like to start by saying this day was even in the LA Times today!
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/unleashed/2010/05/happy-frog-jumping-day.html
Here is the history of this day:
In 1865, Samuel l. Clemens (Mark Twain) penned “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County”, a tall tale of the life and happenings of the gold rush town, Angels Camp. The narrator details a story he heard in a tavern. It is about a frog, Dan’l Webster, who could out jump any other frog, and a man, Jim Smiley, who was the “curiousest man about always betting on anything that turned up you ever see, if he could get anybody to bet on the other side; and if he couldn’t he’d change sides.” (1) Jim Smiley had bet forty dollars. Smiley was figuring that his frog could “out jump any frog in Calaveras County”. (2) He met a stranger who filled Dan’l Webster with buckshot, therefore winning the frog jump and the forty dollars in gold. Figuring out what happened Smiley ran after the stranger but he never caught him.
In Calaveras County they still have a frog jumping contest every year. This year being celebrated May 13-16.
Here is the winner from 2009
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