Comments on: What’s less fun than telling your kids at the mall that Santa Claus doesn’t exist?

By: Joanelle

Joanelle — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 19:00:11 +0000

i wish we had some evidence Santa was real

By: Sarah Jean

Sarah Jean — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 15:26:14 +0000

Amazing article! I had no idea about the way that “Santa” has appeared throughout history. Thanks for the lesson…didn’t seem like a lesson though…a lot more entertaining than school

By: Nathan

Nathan — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 10:41:14 +0000

This is an interesting piece. It caused me to think about the Santa I grew up with in a very real way. I realized that I did (in a way) treat Santa Claus as a kind of spiritual deity, after all he did know what I wanted for Christmas without me directly telling him. He also knew if I was good or not. It seems like a prime example of how a factual or historical person can be transformed into something similar, if not something completely distinct. A nice 2007 NY Times piece by John McGuckin of Columbia University goes along quite nicely with this one.