Christmas Trivia

In 1836, Alabama is the first state in the USA to declare Christmas a legal holiday.

Mexicans call the poinsettia "Flower of the Holy Night" - the Holy Night is the Mexican way of saying
"Christmas Eve".

In ancient Scandinavia, mistletoe was associated with peace and friendship. That may account for the custom of "kissing beneath the mistletoe".

"White Christmas" (1954), starring Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye, was the first movie to be made in Vista Vision, a deep-focus process.

A Christmas club, a savings account in which a person deposits a fixed amount of money regularly to be used at Christmas for shopping, came about around 1905.

"The Nutcracker" is the name for the ballet performed around Christmas time each year. "The Nutcracker Suite" is the title of the music Tchaikovsky wrote.

"Wassail" comes from the Old Norse "ves heill"--to be of good health. This evolved into the tradition of visiting neighbors on Christmas Eve and drinking to their health.

Animal Crackers are not really crackers, but cookies that were imported to the United States from England in the late 1800s. Barnum's circus-like boxes were designed with a string handle so that they could be hung on a Christmas tree.

Electric Christmas tree lights were first used in 1895. The idea for using electric Christmas lights came from an American, Ralph E. Morris. The new lights proved safer than the traditional candles.

Births on 25 December:
W C Field (1946)
Alice Cooper (1945)
Princess Alexandra (1936)
Paul Borget (1935)
Charles Spencer Chaplin (1889)

Deaths on 25 December:
Conrad Hilton (1979)
Humphrey Bogart (1957)
Dorothy Wordsworth (1855)
Sir Isaac Newton (1727)