Fun holiday facts make for great conversation.
Here are 12 Fun Facts to liven things up
(and there’s no need to sing them to the 12 Days of Christmas).
1
Buying all the gifts from the 12 Days of Christmas would cost you well over $39,000 – and the price goes up every year. The most expensive is the “7 Swans a-swimming”, estimated at $6,500.
5
Rudolph the Red-Nosed reindeer actually started as an advertising gimmick for Montgomery Ward in 1939. The song came out in 1941, was recorded by Gene Autry, and was the #1 hit on the U.S. charts Christmas week.
9
Christmas lights were so expensive at the turn of last century that they were usually rented vs. purchased. An electrically lit tree was considered a status symbol in the early 1900s.
2
Despite all the hype, Black Friday is not the busiest shopping day of the year. The two days before Christmas are – which, given it falls on the same date every year, confirms people like to procrastinate.
6
The campaign “Toys for Tots” was founded in Los Angeles in 1947. 5,000 todays were collected during the very first drive, and a handmade doll was the first donation.
10
The first Salvation Army kettle collection took place in San Francisco’s Oakland Ferry at the foot of Market Street. It was a large crab pot with a sign over it that read “Keep the pot boiling” – referring to helping people to have enough food to eat.
3
“Jingle Bells” was originally a song about Thanksgiving, first sung in 1857. It was also the first song ever played in space by astronauts Walter Schirra Jr. and Thomas P. Stafford.
7
It took Charles Dickens only 6 weeks to write “A Christmas Carol” – and it remains the book for which he is the most well-known.
11
The city of Vancouver, Canada, claims to be the birthplace of the first “ugly Christmas sweater” party. Should we thank them for that?
4
Christmas trees usually grow for close to 15 years before being large enough to sell. Talk about a long product development cycle!
8
Visa cards are used over 6,000 times per minute during the Christmas season.
12
The first batch of eggnog originated from the Posset – a hot milkly ale-like drink popular in medieval Britain. Wassail!