Our vintage Santa Claus ornament is 6 inches tall. The Santa Claus ornament is holding metal streamers with stars in one hand and a teddy bear in the other. The teddy bear is wearing a red scarf around his neck and holding a candy cane. Santa Claus is wearing a blue Santa Suit with toys hanging from his belt. Santa is walking on a patch of snow covered with iridescent glitter and decorated with holly leaves and berries. The tin vintage Santa Claus ornament hangs from a gold cord.
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Santa Claus Around the World.
Moore became widely known in the United States and Santa Claus was soon adopted as the figurehead of a new sort of Christmas. One that was more domestic and less boisterous and focused on December 24 and 25 instead of December 6 or 31. One who was capable of generating revenue for merchants, who began using Santa in their advertising. From the 1820’s
until the American Civil War of the 1860’s, a number of images of Santa Claus appeared, each
wildly different form the others.
The first widely distributed picture of Santa Claus appeared in an 1841 newspaper and showed a smiling middle aged Santa with a pointed beard in the act of entering a chimney. The cover of an 1846 piece of sheet music entitled “Santa Claus’ Quadrilles” depicted a beardless young man with a cape and a sack of toys. Sometimes he was portrayed as a Dutchman with tricorn hat, red breeches and yellow stockings, or sometimes he wore a red fur trimmed cap.
Thomas Nast was a talented artist working for Harper’s Weekly during the American civil War. In his depiction of the Union war effort, he drew several pictures of Santa Claus. One was of Santa standing on a roof with his reindeer, while in the house below a wife prays for her soldier husband, one where he is watching over sleeping children and one where he is bringing presents to Federalist troops in their camp. These pictures helped to associate Christmas with both patriotism and the hope of family reunion, which were important to the spread of Christmas observances in the 19th century America. Nast’s Santa Claus was elfish, never quite full size and clothed in fur suits, aspects that would in time change but his kindly, bearded face under a fur cap that won the hearts of the American public. After the war Nast continued to draw Santa Claus and influence the way the world thought of him. That would be in a North Pole workshop full of toys, keeping a list of good ad bad children, he would be a symbol not just of the season but also of the love for children.
As Santa Claus grew more widely known and as Christmas time became less raucous and more domestic, many gift bringers around the world came to resemble Santa. In the 19th century Pere Noel, Father Christmas and Weihnachtsmann came to be viewed in France, England, and Germany, as kindly, elderly conveyors of presents for children and the wilder Knecht Ruprecht, Ru Klaus and Belsnickel faded in importance or became subordinates. The Christmas Elves of European folklore were often mischievous became milder, such as the elves in Santa’s workshop or like Julenissen, came to resemble Santa himself.
By the early 1900’s Santa Claus was an omnipresent part of the North American Christmas scene. His image was on cards and in advertisements. He appeared in stories, plays and motion pictures. His appearance was accepted as a rotund, jolly, bearded man clad in boots and a red, fur trimmed jacket bound with a broad belt. He sometimes wore a cap and sometimes a longer robe but he was distinguishable from his European counterparts, who generally wore a hooded garment and who tended to be more stately and less rotund.
Despite criticisms Santa Claus remains the embodiment of Christmas for hundreds of millions of people all around the planet and he looks to be well established for the future.
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Santa of the Year Award.
In 1995 the Santa Claus of Greenland Foundation instituted the Santa of the Year Award to be given each Christmas “to an individual person, who is internationally recognized for humanistic views and deeds and who is committed to furthering awareness of the need for improvements in the welfare of children throughout the world.” That year President Nelson Mandela of South Africa was given the award by the premier of Greenland, along with $100,000 to be used for children’s charities.
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