When they had sung many songs, and talked of many things they had done together, they toasted Bilbo’s birthday, and they drank his health and Frodo’s together according to Frodo’s custom
The Fellowship of the Ring, Three is Company
After Bilbo Baggins left Bag End after his 111th birthday, Frodo Baggins gave a toast to his uncle on Bilbo and his uncle’s birthday. (They both shared the same birth date.) Samwise Gamgee carried on the tradition after Frodo and Bilbo made the trip to the Undying Lands. I would like to think that Frodo Gardner (the oldest son of Samwise and his wife Rose Cotton) continued the celebration as well.
The Tolkien Society carried on with this event, but did it on January third, J.R.R. Tolkien’s birthday. At nine o’clock your local time you raise your glass and say “The Professor!” and take a sip or swig of your beverage. Today is Tolkien’s twelvety-third birthday, a very queer number indeed, as Bilbo would have said.
I celebrated the day today alone with some of his writings and some rum.