this is only a guess
probably the cell was formatted as text. is the number on the leftside of
the cell or on the right cell.

try this . hope you succeed
suppose the no.(?)(for e.g. 38548) is in cell a1 but in text format
in some other cell type
=A1+0
then in the new cell the number will be in number format
now format this as date
you can then manouver

try this in some other NEW sheet ALSO then you will know whether your sheet
is protected or not


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==============================
Eve wrote in message
...
I have been trying that and it doesn't work. The 5 digit numbers just
remain
there even though I choose the format for those cells to show the date
with
format of mm/dd/yy. It's like I somehow locked it or protected it and I
can't undo it. Any other advice?

"R.VENKATARAMAN" wrote:

select the cell and in menu bar
format-cells-number- dates
choose any format you want.
including mm/dd/yyyy

mine excel 2000
=====================


Eve wrote in message
...
Somehow I accidentally hit a key(s) and caused my dates in one column
of
my
worksheet to convert to corresponding 5 digit numbers. Each date has
its
own
unique number (i.e. 7/1/2005 now reads 38534). I want to change it
back
so
that is actually displays the dates. How do I do that?

I'm using MS Office Excel 2003 running on XP.

Thanks.