Watauga Democrat. [volume] (Boone, Watauga County, N.C.) 1888-current, 1929-12-26
SANTA CLAUS Is
AN AMERICAN
English Children Know Him Only as
Father Christmas, While German
Youngsters Call Him kriss krin-
gle. French and Italian Riddles Get
No Gifts.
By CALEB JOHNSON

All over Cne WOrlO on CIe ZCCn OI
December Christians of all creeds and
sects celebrate the birth of the Mes
siah with the festival of Christmas
the Mass of Christ. But only in
countries where traditions and cul-
ture derive from Teutonic sources
do folk celebrate the day by giving
presents.
In Italy, France, Spain, the ma
tions of South America and other
countries where the Latin culture
prevails, Christmas is celebrated as a
great church festival, but nobody
thinks of giving anybody present at
Christmas time. New Years Day is
their great gift time.
In Germany and in all the coun-
tries having the Teutonic background
which includes Norway, Sweden and
Denmark, Austria, Switzerland, Hol-
land, Belgium, England and the
British Dominions and the United
States, Christmas has become the
great gift-making season of the year,
especially the time for giving pres
ents to children.
Santa Claus himself, however, is
an American,
The. children of England have nev-
er heard of Santa Claus, unless they
read American stories. The jolly old
chap with white whiskers who fills
the stockings secretly on Christmas
Eve is known to the little ones of
the British Empire as Father Christ
mas"
German children call the stock
ing-filler "Kriss Kringle," and by
thet name he is known in some parts
of the United States and elsewhere.
g 'Kriss Kringle" is a corruption of
the German "Kriskindlein," the
Christ Child. The peasant folk of
Germany have come to believe that
the giving of Christmas presents is
symbolic of the bringing of gifts to
the manger at Bethlehem by the
Wise Men of the East. But that is
not the source from which Christ
mas giving originated.
Secret gifts to children are trib-
ute to the memory of st. Nicholas,
just as the name Santa Claus" is
an Americanization of the Dutch
name of that good old father of the
church. "San Niklaas" as the early
Dutch settlers of New York called
the patron saint of children, schol-
ars, merchants and sailors, sounded
like "Santa Claus" to the ears of the
English children, who learned of him
from their Dutch playmates. And
Santa Claus he has been ever since
to generations of American children,
though up to fifty or sixty years ago
it was not considered dignified by
the grown-ups to refer to him except
by his full name, St. Nicholas.
Tho fiuI1rQ of St NioHnloc
little fat man in a fur-trimmed coat,
riding in a sleigh drawn by reindeer
and slipping down chimneys with a
pack on his back, to fill the stock
ings which hung from the mantel of
the open fireplace, was given its
present fixed form by Clement C.
Moore, wh o S e poem beginning
"'Twas the night before Christmas"
ago. Mr.. Moore did not call him
"a Visit from ST. Nicholas"
Who was the real ST. Nicholas?
Why is he associated with the giving
of presents to children?
Nobody knows very much about
him. Like some of the other leaders
of the early Christians, a mass of
le"ond and myth has grown up about
his name, but the records are
strangely silent.
All that is known definitely is that
he was the Bishop of Myra, a town
in Asia Minor, about three hundred
years after Christ. Nobody knows
how the legends about him started,
but he was held in such high esteem
that within a century or two after
his death thousands of churches
were named for him. In England
alone there were at one time a thou
sand churches of st. Nicholas, and
he was established as the patron
saint of all Russia away back in the
Middle Ages.
Pictures of st. Nicholas usually
show him standing in a tub with
three boys. The legend back of this
is that he miraculously restored to
life three youths who had been killed
by a innkeeper and their dismem-.
bered bodies packed in a salt-tub.
But the story of st. Nicholas, which
associates his name with secret gifts
is that he learned of poor man
with three daughters, who were un-
able to get husbands because they
had no dowries. Their father was
planning to kill the daughters and
himself when st. Nicholas slipped
into their cottage by night and filled
the stockings of the daughters with
gold!
st. Nicholas Day is December 6,
and for thousand years the Eve of