Santa Claus, you know him, you love him but do you know how he came to be? There is so, so much more than the jolly old man with rosy red cheeks who comes to your house every Christmas.
Santa Clause, believe it or not, started out as a kid named Nick. He lived in a time where the Romans were waiting for the permission to persecute Christians. One day, a very tragic thing happened, and both his wealthy parents died. He became a bishop as a young man and soon learned that there was a father who didn’t have enough money to pay for his ]1st daughter’s dowry. As soon as he heard about it, he put together enough money to pay for the first daughter’s dowry and put it in the house in the middle of the night. A couple years later he did it for the second daughter’s dowry, and a couple years later he did it again for the 3rd and final daughter. But, after Nick dropped off the gold for the second time, the father became suspicious and caught him dropping off the gold for the third daughter, and though Nick begged him not to tell anyone the father spread the word across the whole village. Years later the Romans came to round up all of the Christians and Nicholas was among them. He spent his life in prison until he was an old man when the order came out to free all Christians given from Emperor Diocletian. He spent the rest of his years as bishop of Myra giving back to the poor and helping those in need. He died in 343 C.E. on what we think (No joke intended) December 5, 6, or 7. But he did not yet become the Santa Clause we know today.
Before the poem, A visit from Saint Nicholas, written by Clement Clark Moore, Saint Nick didn’t look what you think Santa Claus looked like. It was only in this poem, did the illustrations feature Santa in his red coat and hat. Before this, he just dressed like a normal bishop from the time. The poem did feature Santa Claus coming down the chimney to deliver presents on a magical sleigh. Thomas Nast’s illustrations show the plump man in a coat and hat. People combined the Christmas traditions with St. Nicholas day, so now we get our presents from Santa Claus on December 25th!
Merry Christmas
