On December 23, 1823, “A Visit From St. Nicholas,” perhaps the most famous and influential Christmas poem ever is published in the Troy Sentinel newspaper in New York by an anonymous author. Called "arguably the best-known verses ever written,” it would shape the modern image of Santa Claus as "a right jolly old elf" who travels through the air in a reindeer-powered sleigh on Christmas eve, bounding down chimneys after children are asleep to leave them holiday gifts.
Often referred to as “The Night Before Christmas” or “‘Twas the Night Before Christmas” in reference to its opening lines, the playful poem tells the story of a family settling in on Christmas Eve before the parents are awakened by the sounds St. Nick and his reindeer clattering onto their roof.
The poem, written in the galloping rhythm of anapestic tetrameter, solidified the iconic image of Santa Claus as the jovial, big-bellied gift-giver we know today:
A bundle of toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a pedler just opening his pack.
His eyes—how they twinkled! his dimples, how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!...
He had a broad face and a little round belly
That shook when he laughed, like a bowl full of jelly.
The poem also reintroduced St. Nicholas—the fourth century patron saint of children—to a wider audience, after he had faded into obscurity, barely known in America by hardly anyone outside of old Dutch communities. In the Netherlands, children would traditionally leave their shoes out on the night of December 5 for Sinterklaas, hoping he would fill them with candy and not a lump of coal.
Yet while the poem elevated Santa to ubiquity, its author remained a mystery for many years. It wasn’t until nearly 20 years later, in 1844, that American writer Clement Clarke Moore claimed authorship after seeing the poem misattributed in the Washington National Intelligencer.
Moore took credit for the poem, claiming to have authored “some lines, describing a visit from St. Nicholas, which I wrote many years ago...not for publication, but to amuse my children.”
