Xmas Facts

1. Contrary to popular belief, the Bible doesnt actually mention a specific date for Jesus birth. In fact, most historians believe he was probably born in the spring, hence the Bibles description of shepherds herding animals. But in the 4th century, when the Catholic Church decided to recognize Jesus birth as an official holiday, Pope Julius I chose December 25 for the Feast of the Nativity. That the date happened to coincide with the pagan festival .....

War on Christmas

2. Five months into the first World War, troops along the Western front took a Christmas Eve break from fighting to sing carols to one another across the battlefield. The following morning, German soldiers emerged from the trenches and began to approach Allied troops while calling out Merry Christmas in English. Luckily, it wasnt a trick; dozens of British fighters came out to greet them and shake hands, some even exchanging cigarettes as gifts. Lat .....

Christmas in the Colonies

3. From 1659 to 1681, showcasing ones holiday spirit in Boston could cost you a fine of as much as five shillings. Thats right Christmas used to be illegal. Its somewhat surprising, then, that the same puritanical minds also created the first American batch of eggnog at Captain John Smiths 1607 Jamestown settlement. (The word nog comes from the word grog; that is, any drink made with rum.) Christmas was so inconsequential in early America that afte .....

Xmas Lit 101

4. The author best known for creating the Headless Horseman also created the iconic image of Santa flying in a sleigh. In his 1819 series of short stories The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, New York native Washington Irving described a dream in which St. Nicholas soared across the sky in a weightless wagon. The stories became so popular, they spawned a Christmas revival of sorts in the States, and even Charles Dickens is said to have credited Irvin .....

What Advertising Hath Wrought

5. Like the Energizer Bunny, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer got his start as an advertising gimmick. A copywriter named Robert L. May first created the merry misfit in 1939 to lure shoppers into the Montgomery Ward department store. Frosty the Snowman and his famous corncob pipe couldnt escape the clutches of the advertising industry either; a whiskeymaker in 1890 used Frostys likeness to showcase an entirely different kind of holiday cheer. Once Pr .....

NASAs Christmas Sighting

6. In 1965 two astronauts on their way back to orbit spotted something in space they couldnt identify. Frantic, they radioed Mission Control. After several minutes of tense silence, engineers at Cape Canaveral began hearing the faint jingle of sleigh bells followed by a harmonica rendition of Jingle Bells played by none other than the two frantic astronauts. The men later donated the harmonica and bells to the National Museum of Space & Aeronautics .....

Kiss Me; Im Celtic

7. According to Celtic and Teutonic legend, mistletoe is magical it can heal wounds, increase fertility, bring good luck and ward off evil spirits. The tradition of kissing under the mistletoe didnt begin until the Victorian era, a surprising origin given the stuffy and sexually repressive behavior of the time. Actually, its not very surprising at all. .....

O Tannenbaum

8. Even before the arrival of Christianity, Germans decorated evergreen trees to brighten the dark, gloomy days of the winter solstice. The first Christmas trees appeared in Strasbourg in the 17th century and spread to Pennsylvania in the 1820s with the arrival of German immigrants. When Queen Victoria married Germanys Prince Albert in 1840, he brought the tradition to England. Eight years later, the first American newspaper ran a picture of the roy .....

Away in a Manger

9. Since the Great Depression, the Rockettes have shared Radio City Music Hall with live farm animals from camels to donkeys to sheep to stage a live nativity scene for its annual Christmas Spectacular. But the world saw its first living nativity in 1224, when St. Francis of Assisi re created the birth of Jesus to explain the holiday to his followers. During that first display, the manger was also used as an altar for Christmas Mass. .....

Feliz Navidad Around the World

10. Christmas traditions vary from culture to culture. Finns often visit saunas on Christmas Eve, while Portuguese revelers hold a feast on Christmas Day for the living and the dead (extra places are set for the souls of the deceased). In Greece, some believe that goblins called kallikantzeri run wild during the 12 days of Christmas, and most Greeks dont exchange presents until Jan. 1, St. Basils Day. Thanks to their geographic location, most Austral .....

Facts 1

11. The common abbreviation for Christmas to Xmas is derived from the Greek alphabet. X is letter Chi, which is the first letter of Christs name in the Greek alphabet.Oliver Cromwell, in England banned Christmas Carols between 1649 and 1660. Cromwell thought that Christmas should be a very solemn day so he banned carols and parties. The only celebration was by a sermon and a prayer service.In 1643, the British Parliament officially abolishes the cele .....

Facts 2

12. In 1836, Alabama is the first state in the USA to declare Christmas a legal holiday.In 1843, the first Christmas card was printed in England for Sir Henry Cole. He was busy man who wanted to save time in his own Christmas letters, but was also interested in encouraging the expansion of the postal system. 1000 copies of the card were sold at one shilling each. It was not until the 1860s that the production of cards accelerated, with cheaper printi .....

Facts 3

13. In 1834, Queen Victorias husband, Prince Albert brought the first Christmas tree to Windsor Castle for the Royal family.6 December is St Nicholass Day the first of the gift giving days, especially in Holland and Belgium.Some priests in Australia advise you to say Happy Christmas, not Merry Christmas, because Merry has connotations of getting drunk which brings its own problems. One should say Happy instead.The actual gift givers are different .....

Facts 4

14. Tom Smith who owned a sweet shop in London was the originator of the cracker. In the 1840s Tom found that people like sugar almonds, but while he was in France he discovered a variety of sweets wrapped up in a twist of paper. These bonbons were popular, so Tom decided to copy them. When Tom noticed that young men were buying them to give to their sweethearts he began to place love mottoes on small slips of paper inside the sweet wrapping.In 1846 .....

Facts 5

15. In Christmas tree decorations, angels are usually portrayed as wimpy blondes in girls blouses and sandals. In the Bible, however, angels are muscular bullies who frequently goad humans into fistfights. Life isnt all harps and heavenly choirs for angels; theres a strict career structure. The only angels mentioned by name in the Bible are archangels, the eighth ranking order of angels. Visitors to Bethlehem rarely exceed a few thousand at Christma .....

Facts 6

16. Ancient Roman observances of the Natalis solis invicti and the Saturnalia occurred in December and involved much feasting, singing, parades and other forms of celebrating. Not to be outdone, when the Church adopted Christmas it introduced a major Christian celebration and feasting became a part of the festivities. As the centuries wore on, depending upon the country, a Christmas goose, turkey or other animal was adopted as the main course in the .....

Origins of Christmas

17. From the Old English .....

Santa Claus

18. The origin of Santa Claus begins in the 4th century with Saint Nicholas, Bishop of Myra, an area in present day Turkey. By all accounts St. Nicholas was a generous man, particularly devoted to children. After his death around 340 A.D. he was buried in Myra, but in 1087 Italian sailors purportedly stole his remains and removed them to Bari, Italy, greatly increasing St. Nicholas popularity throughout Europe. His kindness and reputation for genero .....

Christmas Trees

19. In 16th century Germany fir trees were decorated, both indoors and out, with apples, roses, gilded candies, and colored paper. In the Middle Ages, a popular religous play depicted the story of Adam and Eves expulsion from the Garden of Eden.A fir tree hung with apples was used to symbolize the Garden of Eden the Paradise Tree. The play ended with the prophecy of a saviour coming, and so was often performed during the Advent season.It is held tha .....

Focus on Christmas Traditions in US

20. The variations of the Christmas traditions of USA equal the number active cultures that have settled in the land. These cultural contributions were given a new lease of life by creative artists, authors, poets and songwriters, and it was melded together by the power of secular and commercialized media in record companies, radio stations, television, cinemas and now the internet. The unwritten law of media is the presentation of a seemingly unifor .....

Christmas Stockings

21. According to legend, a kindly nobleman grew despondent over the death of his beloved wife and foolishly squandered his fortune. This left his three young daughters without dowries and thus facing a life of spinsterhood.The generous St. Nicholas, hearing of the girls plight, set forth to help. Wishing to remain anonymous, he rode his white horse by the noblemans house and threw three small pouches of gold coins down the chimney where they were for .....

Mistletoe

22. Mistletoe was used by Druid priests 200 years before the birth of Christ in their winter celebrations. They revered the plant since it had no roots yet remained green during the cold months of winter.The ancient Celtics believed mistletoe to have magical healing powers and used it as an antidote for poison, infertility, and to ward of evil spirits. The plant was also seen as a symbol of peace, and it is said that among Romans, enemies who met und .....

Holly Ivy and Greenery

23. In Northern Europe Christmas occurred during the middle of winter, when ghosts and demons could be heard howling in the winter winds. Boughs of holly, believed to have magical powers since they remained green through the harsh winter, were often placed over the doors of homes to drive evil away. Greenery was also brought indoors to freshen the air and brighten the mood during the long, dreary winter.Legend also has it that holly sprang from the f .....

Poinsettias

24. A native Mexican plant, poinsettias were named after Joel R. Poinsett, U.S. ambassador to Mexico who brought the plant to America in 1828. Poinsettias were likely used by Mexican Franciscans in their 17th century Christmas celebrations. One legend has it that a young Mexican boy, on his way to visit the village Nativity scene, realized he had no gift for the Christ child. He gathered pretty green branches from along the road and brought them to t .....

The Candy cane

25. It was not long after Europeans began using Christmas trees that special decorations were used to adorn them. Food items, such as candies and cookies, were used predominately and straight white candy sticks were one of the confections used as ornamentation. Legend has it that during the 17th century, craftsmen created the white sticks of candy in the shape of shephreds crooks at the suggestion of the choirmaster at the Cologne Cathedral in German .....

Christmas cards

26. A form of Christmas card began in England first when young boys practiced their writing skills by creating Christmas greetings for their parents, but it is Sir Henry Cole who is credited with creating the first real Christmas card. The first director of Londons Victoria and Albert Museum, Sir Henry found himself too busy in the Christmas season of 1843 to compose individual Christmas greetings for his friends.He commissioned artist John Calcott H .....

Rudolph the Red nosed Reindeer

27. The Chicago based Montgomery Ward company, department store operators, had been purchasing and distributing childrens coloring books as Christmas gifts for their customers for several years. In 1939, Montgomery Ward tapped one of their own employees to create a book for them, thus saving money. 34 year old copywriter Robert L. May wrote the story of Rudolph the Red nosed Reindeer in 1939, and 2.4 million copies were handed out that year. Despite .....

Hanukkah

28. Commencing on the 25th day of the Hebrew month Kislev, Hanukkah is a Jewish holiday commemorating the rededication of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem after its desecration by the Syrians.In 168 BC, members of the Jewish family Maccabee led a revolt against the Greek Syrians due to the policies of Syrian King Antiochus IV which were aimed at nullifying the Jewish faith. Part of this strategem included changing the Beit HaMikdash the Holy Temple in .....

Kwanzaa

29. Doctor Maulana Karenga, a Professor at California State University in Long Beach, California, created Kwanzaa in 1966. It is a holiday celebrated by millions of African Americans around the world, encouraging them to remember their African heritage and consider their current place in America today. Kwanzaa is celebrated fom December 26 to January 1 and involves seven principles called Nguzo Saba Umoja (Unity), Kujichagulia (Self determination), U .....