Holiday Trivia

 

• The first “Book of Carols” was printed in 1521.
• Wencelas (907-929) was the king of Bohemia and was noted for his piety, compassion and generosity. The carol about him dates from the 19^th century.
• It was the English who started the custom of kissing under the mistletoe in the early 17^th century. It was customary for a man to remove a berry each time he kissed a girl under the mistletoe. When there were no more berries left, no more kisses were exchanged.
• The Christmas classic “A Visit from St. Nicholas” was written by Clement Clark Moore in 1822 as a gift to his children.
• Electric lights for Christmas trees were first used in 1895.
• “It’s a Wonderful Life” appears on TV more often than any other holiday movie.
• “Rudolph” was created by Montgomery Ward in the late 1930s for a holiday promotion.
• “Jingle Bells was originally written for Thanksgiving.
• If you received all the gifts in the song “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” you would receive 364 gifts.
• The first state to recognize the Christmas holiday was Alabama.
• Christmas became a national holiday in America on June 26, 1870.
• During the Christmas-Hanukkah season, more than 1.76 billion candy canes will be made. Candy canes began as straight white sticks of sugar candy used to decorate the Christmas trees. A choirmaster at Cologne Cathedral decided have the ends bent to depict a shepherd's crook and he would pass them out to the children to keep them quiet during the services. It wasn't until about the 20th century that candy canes acquired their red stripes.
• During the Christmas buying season, Visa cards alone are used an average of 5,340 times every minute in the United States.
• The Christmas season begins at sundown on 24th December and lasts through sundown on 5th January. For that reason, this season is also known as the Twelve Days of Christmas.
• The movie "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" (2000) features more than 52,000 Christmas lights, about 8,200 Christmas ornaments, and nearly 2,000 candy canes.
• The Puritans forbade the singing of Christmas carols.
• Mrs. Claus, Santa's wife, was first introduced in 1889 in the book “Goody Santa Claus on a Sleigh Ride” by the poet Katherine Lee Bates.
• Christmas was declared a federal holiday in the United States on June 26, 1870.

Holiday Trivia: Christmas Trees

In the year 440, the church set December 25 as the date on which Christians would celebrate Jesus’ birth because it coincided with the winter solstice, which was a festival time in most cultures. Scholars suggest the actual birth of Christ was more likely in the spring, when shepherds would be abiding in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night, while the new lambs were being born.

Evergreens have been associated with winter solstice celebrations since long before there was a Christmas season. The Romans decorated their temples with evergreen boughs for the Festival of Saturnalia and the Teutonic people of Northern Europe set up fir trees in their homes as a sign of life in the dead of winter. When Christianity became the norm, the trees stayed. Prince Albert, a German prince, brought the tradition of the Christmas tree with him when he married Queen Victoria in 1840.

In the United States, the earliest known mention of a Christmas tree is in the diary of a German who settled in Pennsylvania.

Franklin Pierce was the first president to decorate an official White House Christmas tree. Theodore Roosevelt, a staunch conservationist, banned Christmas trees in his home, including when he lived in the White House. His children, however, smuggled them into their bedrooms.

America’s official national Christmas tree is located in King’s Canyon National Park in California. The giant sequoia, named the “General Grant Tree,” is over 300 feet high. It was made the official Christmas tree in 1925.

Americans buy 37.1 million real Christmas trees each year; 25 percent are from the nation’s 5,000 tree farms. Trees grown in the wild have sparse branches, so cultured Christmas trees are shaped as they grow to produce fuller foliage. To slow the upward growth and the encourage branching, they are hand-clipped each spring. For every real Christmas tree harvested, two to three saplings are planted in its place.

California, Oregon, Michigan, Washington, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and North Carolina are the top Christmas tree producing states. The best selling trees are Scotch pine, Douglas fir, Fraser fir, Virginia pine, Balsam fir and white pine.

Christmas trees are edible. Many parts of pines, spruces and firs can be eaten. The needles are a good source of vitamin C. Pine nuts, or pine cones, are also a good source of nutrition.

Germany made the first artificial Christmas trees. They were made of goose feathers and dyed green.