Welcome back! If you're just now dropping by, you might want to visit the previous couple of posts to catch up to speed on my research of Christmas and its traditions: here and here.
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Where did our American Christmas traditions come from?
Our current American Christmas traditions are a far cry from those of the early Roman winter solstice celebrations. In fact, early American celebrations mimicked the ancient chaos and noise. But things gradually shifted to a more calm and serene picture, thanks to a few specific influences.
In 1819, Washington Irving wrote The Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon, gent. This was a story of a wealthy man who welcomed the poor into his home for Christmas. These different social classes intermingled and celebrated many "traditions" together. Irving's story perhaps helped recreate a warm, friendly, generous image of the holiday. Many of the traditions he wrote about are thought to have been made up.
Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol around this time as well. It, of course, encouraged peace and sharing.
In 1828, New York City instituted its first police force because Christmas riots were getting out of hand.
I found this statement from my source interesting: The family was also becoming less disciplined and more sensitive to the emotional needs of children during the early 1800s. (I would say this practice has never stopped and can be seen on the extreme far opposite end of the spectrum today...but that's for another post that I will never write until I have children and can thus escape the criticism of writing something I know nothing about.) Christmas became an excuse for parents to dump gifts on their kids that they normally wouldn't give otherwise.
Many traditions were resurrected from other cultures and customs as Christmas gained popularity in the States. Americans fell back on these old traditions because they didn't know what Christmas celebrating was supposed to look like. Over the course of the years, traditions have been adopted and adapted, and continue to grow and change today.
Next post: What Does the Christmas Tree Have to do with Christ?
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Sources:
http://www.history.com/content/christmas/the-real-story-of-christmas
2 comments:
Great job on the research, Splitter. I had a friend who grew up Church of Christ, and I couldn't believe that they didn't put a Christmas tree up in their sanctuary, but it makes sense that their reason was that Dec 25 isn't actually the day of Christ's birth. And on a different path, my pastor's son describes Christmas as "a consumeristic orgy". It's interesting that it's been going on since the 1800s.
Thanks DeMo! I feel a lot like I'm back in school, writing a research paper with these Christmas blogs. But I'm learning so much! Stay tuned for more on that Christmas tree you mentioned...
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