The Everything Family Christmas Book (47 page)

Scoring

How do you (or your group) rate?

• 20 or fewer correct:
  As a general rule, you’ve been doing something other than watching television at Christmas over the past thirty or forty years. Congratulations on that, but don’t pick “Holiday Films” as a
  Jeopardy
  category.
  
• 21 to 40 correct:
  Okay. You got the easy ones. You’ve been rocking to “Jingle Bell Rock,” but you could probably stand to rent
  It’s a Wonderful Life
  a time or two.
  
• 41 to 60 correct:
  You’ve definitely got the holiday spirit, but Andy Williams still thinks you can do better.
  
• 61 to 80 correct:
  Nice work. You can probably recite the lyrics to “White Christmas” without batting an eye. Spread the good cheer!
  
• 81 to 100 correct:
  Nat King Cole is crooning “The Christmas Song” just for you.
  
• 101 to 106 correct:
  You can probably recite the entire script of
  The Grinch Who Stole Christmas
  verbatim—from deep sleep. Take a bow.
  

10
A Century of the American Christmas

A
lthough its roots extend back for centuries, the Christmas that North Americans know and love is fundamentally a twentieth-century phenomenon. Take Santa, for example: It wasn’t until a nationwide ad campaign for Coca-Cola in the 1920s that he came with a consistent look. In fact, Christmas wasn’t an official holiday throughout the United States until 1890—and even at that time, New Year’s Day was a strong competitor for the honor of prime gift-giving holiday. The following surveys and excerpts from published accounts of Christmases past offer a glimpse of the holiday’s evolution.

Christmas in the 1900s

In the first decade of the 1900s, technology was making its influence known, as the automobile rolled onto the roads in earnest and the Wright brothers made their first flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. Many Americans shopped by catalog from Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward, and the toy teddy bear made its first appearance, thanks to a cartoon that showed Theodore Roosevelt sparing the life of a bear.

Your Christmas Budget in the 1900s

Wondering what you might have bought for friends and family at the beginning of the twentieth century? Here are some popular items from the 1900s, with their prices, taken from contemporary newspapers and magazine ads:

• Men’s smoking jacket: $5.00

• Women’s corset (“All popular sizes”): $1.59

• Sheet-music cabinet: $6.25

• Phonograph: $150.00

• China candlestick: 50 cents

• Boys’ worsted sweater: $2.00

• Toy sewing machine: $1.00

• Toy automobile “with rubber tire wheels”: $2.50

• Elevated railroad set: $5.00

• Clothbound copy of
Peck’s Bad Boy:
39 cents

Peck’s Bad Boy
was Henry Peck, a fictional boy created by author George Peck. Henry wasn’t very enthusiastic about rules, and gained huge popularity around the turn of the century for the pranks that he played. The stories, which appeared in newspapers and books, were even made into movies in the 1920s and 1930s.

In the News in the 1900s

Morgan Celebrates the Season

NEW YORK, December 23—Ten clerks employed by J. Pierpont Morgan are reported to have each received from the banker a present of a $5,000 gold certificate. A messenger for Mr. Morgan drew the bills from the subtreasury.

For the benefit of those who are not on intimate terms with $5,000 gold certificates, it may be explained that they are among the most beautiful examples of the printer’s art. In color they are a most effective blending of orange, black, and green.

—1901
Boston Globe
account

An Act of Benevolence

Pay the Boy a Nickel!

To the Editor:

Every person purchasing a paper [on Christmas Eve] should pay the newsboy therefor five cents [instead of the customary two]. The amount will not be missed by the giver and a great good will result.

—Letter appearing in the
Boston Globe

A Poem Suitable for the Season
The merry halls may jingle in the good, old-fashioned way;
In merriment we mingle, with the music holding sway.
The “Gloria in Excelsis” is sounding everywhere.
But, really, tisn’t Christmas, if Mother isn’t there.

She hangs a newer halo round the mistletoe on high;
A spirit of bravado drew away the weary sigh—
For sorrow is no mistress, and life lets go its fear
Amid the joys of Christmas, when Mother, dear, is here.

The fire upon the hearthstone lights up with ruddier glow;
The laughter is more mirthsome, bubbling forth in frolic flow;
The Christ Child truly comes to us, in all His heavenly cheer,
If the advent of old Christmas finds Mother, also, here.

—William Hopkins

A Thought for the Holiday Season

On the seamy side there comes at Christmas a feeling that the word is, to those who are not of the elect, most unkind; and it is the experience of police that most of the injudicious, unlimited drinking … is not caused so much by the exuberance of people wanting to celebrate Christmas, as by the efforts of those who would forget.

—Boston Globe
editorial in support of the growing movement toward prohibition of liquor

Christmas Advertising in the 1900s

Dependable Goods, Fair Prices, and Your Goodwill
are responsible for the throngs which have filled out stores and the marked enthusiasm displayed during these Xmas holidays. Although the buying has been beyond expectation and our assortments are yet complete, still each day makes a large hole in the stock. In order not to carry over Xmas Goods, from now on goods will be marked at prices that will be simply irresistible. Come and profit during these last two days.

—Gilchrist Department Store advertisement

Christmas in the 1910s

The industrial age and mass production were the hallmarks of this decade, with the one millionth Model T Ford in production and names such as Chevrolet and Dodge making an appearance. Popular toys included Lincoln Logs, Tinker Toys, and the Erector Set. From 1914 to 1918, however, our attention was firmly focused on Europe, where World War I was being fought by soldiers from Canada and other countries around the world, and from 1917–1918, soldiers from the United States as well.

Your Christmas Budget in the 1910s

It’s amazing to think that you can still buy a folding umbrella for under $10.00—but the $1,250.00 automobile today might not be such a smart buy.

• Women’s leather handbag: $3.50

• Folding umbrella (“indispensable when traveling”): $4.00

• Opera glasses: $5.00

• French plume: $1.95

• Singer “sewmachine”: $24.50

• “Self-starting” Everett automobile: $1,250.00

• Girls’ wool dress: $2.95

In the News in the 1910s

A Plea

Dear Santa, I’ve got to go
To bed—it’s late, you see—
So listen, please, for you must know
Just what to bring to me.
I want a pair of skates, a knife,
A pony that can trot;
I want a nice big drum and fife
And all the books you’ve got.
I want a kite with miles of string
And several Christmas trees
But when you come this year, don’t bring
Another baby, please.

—Anonymous poem, circa 1915

Better Late Than Never

It occurred to a Pittsfield man yesterday that Christmas was coming. In that merry relation, a thought struck him. Glancing up at a shelf in the office where he is employed, he saw thereon a package [addressed to a friend], which just one year ago his wife had given him to mail … He sent the package along …

—From the Berkshire Evening Eagle, 1911

Christmas Advertising in the 1910s

Churchill’s Wonderful Christmas Review, “Cornell’s Follies”

For the entertainment of our many guests, and in keeping with the Christmas Spirit of Gladness and Good-will, we present this extraordinary review headed by the “Cornells” and assisted by a chorus of
twenty beautiful girls.
… We promise an evening of delightful entertainment, bewildering in the variety of its enjoyment.
Churchill’s: More than a restaurant—a Broadway institution. Broadway at 49th St.

Christmas in the 1920s

The 1920s bring to mind the age of flapper fashion and jazz music, but the years also brought new fashions in art and architecture, from art deco to modernism. Frank Lloyd Wright was active in this decade, and in 1927, Charles Lindbergh made the first solo flight across the Atlantic in the
Spirit of St. Louis.
Hot toys included die-cast metal toys, the Raggedy Ann doll, and, toward the end of the decade, the yo-yo.