THINGS YOU MIGHT NOT KNOW ABOUT CHRISTMAS

A CHRISTMAS GIMMICK

You probably wouldn’t have guessed it but the beloved Christmas icon

was actually born as an advertising gimmick in 1939. Copyrighter

Robert May created him for Montgomery Ward to lure shoppers

into the department store.

RUDOLPH – ALL TALK?

In the original TV adaptation Rudolph never helps the toys on the

Island of Misfit, in spite of his promise to do so. This led to

numerous complaints by parents that Rudolph had broken his promise,

so producers later added a scene at the end where Rudolph leads

Santa to the Island to collect the toys.

RENT-A-SANTA

Every year in the United States about 20,000 Rent-a-Santa’s are hired.

Evidently, however, it isn’t the easiest job in the world. These Santa’s

undergo training on how to cope with pressure from the public, how to

deal with rowdy children, and even what not to eat to avoid having

bad breath.

RENT-A-CON

So, if there are 20,000 Rent-a-Santa’s running around putting children

on their lap and handing out candy, one naturally has to wonder,

how many of these guys have criminal records?

According to pre-imply.com the number is 7%.

SPEEDY SANTA

According to UNICEF, there are 2,106 million children under the age of

18 in the world. If you do the maths it works out to about 842 million

stops that Santa would have to make on Christmas Eve, meaning he

would have to travel about 221 million miles in total. In order to reach

every stop that night he would need to go from house to house in

less than 1/5,000 of a second, requiring an acceleration of 12.19 million

miles per second every time.

XMAS

A popular abbreviation for Christmas, the X represents the Greek letter

Chi, or the first letter of the word “Christ”. During the 16th Century,

European Christians began using the Chi as a symbolic abbreviation for

Christmas just as the Chi-Rho had often been used as a symbolic

abbreviation for Christ. Although in former centuries this association

was understood, in recent times this has led to misunderstanding

and controversy.

THE SANTA CAUSE

Every year the North Pole, Alaska gets hundreds of thousands of letters

from children all over the world. Volunteers from the small town of

1,600 make an effort to reply to every letter that has a return address.

THE STATUE OF LIBERTY

In 1886 the United States became the recipient of the largest Christmas

present in history when France presented it with the Statue of Liberty.

A WEIGHTLESS CHRISTMAS

In December of 1965 two American astronauts spotted something they

were unable to identify on their way back to orbit. After frantically

radioing into mission control, several minutes of tense silence followed.

A moment later everyone on the ground began to make out the sound

of Jingle Bells being played on a harmonica. The astronauts later donated

their musical instruments to the National Museum of Space and Aeronautics.

CHRISTMAS TRUCE OF 1914

On the morning of December 25th, 1914, German soldiers on the

Western front stepped out of their trenches and walked towards Allied

troops calling out “Merry Christmas” in English. What followed was one

of the greatest expressions of camaraderie in history. Soldiers mingled,

exchanged cigarettes, and even played a game of football.

The event was dramatized in the French film Joyeux Noel.