0:01

Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class,

0:03

a production of iHeartRadio.

0:12

Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly

0:14

Frye and I'm Tracy V. Wilson.

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So, as this episode airs, we

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are already into Advent, both

0:21

on the religious calendar and as

0:23

the word relates to Christmas countdown calendars

0:26

and those two things. Even though the

0:29

countdown calendars have become very very secular

0:31

in some iterations, they still share a

0:33

root origin. And today you can get

0:35

gift calendars that are called Advent calendars

0:38

don't even count down to Christmas, they don't really reference

0:40

Advent at all, but they'll still get called that, right,

0:43

Like there are birthday countdown calendars you can

0:45

get. It's doesn't have anything to do with Advent,

0:47

but the name has become so

0:49

connected to this idea of a countdown calendar.

0:52

And to talk about Advent calendars, which is

0:55

really what this episode is about, we do

0:57

have to talk about the religious observation of

0:59

Ada, which has historically

1:01

been less clear cut in execution than

1:04

you may imagine. I feel like, especially

1:06

if someone's not deeply religious or if they're not

1:09

Catholic, they're like, Advent has a lot

1:11

of rules well kind of, we'll

1:14

see, they don't always get

1:19

they have certainly not always, and even today

1:21

they don't always get observed in the same ways.

1:23

And the transition to commercially available

1:26

products that are more about the secular celebration

1:29

of Christmas than the religious one, but still

1:31

have the same name centers

1:33

more than anything on children

1:36

and private celebrations, and how that

1:38

kind of changed over to be something else.

1:40

But the commercial version

1:42

of the Advent calendar, i will say, is

1:44

a pretty recent development. So that's what we're talking

1:46

about today. So the word advent

1:49

comes from the Latin ad venire to

1:51

come to, and you'll sometimes

1:54

see the word adventists, which means

1:56

arrival. So from a religious

1:59

perspective, Advent is part

2:01

of Christian religious preparation for

2:04

Christmas. Just does a note

2:06

of clarity, Like we were talking about non

2:08

Orthodox, like not

2:11

the Orthodox churches, but like

2:13

Catholicism, most Protestant

2:15

denominations. Right, there are other

2:18

versions of Advent within those

2:20

other religions, but they they're

2:23

on a slightly different calendar and they don't

2:25

track quite the same way. Right, So

2:28

the common version of Advent that

2:30

our listeners are probably most familiar

2:33

with runs over four Sundays leading

2:35

up to Christmas ending on Christmas

2:37

Eve. So, for example, the year that

2:39

we're recording this in twenty twenty

2:41

three, Advent is on the shorter

2:43

side because Christmas Eve is on a Sunday,

2:46

so this is from Sunday, December third

2:48

to Sunday December twenty fourth.

2:51

This period is intended to be a time of

2:53

reflection and preparation for the Christmas

2:55

holiday, and it's also considered

2:57

a preparation for the second Coming of Christ.

3:00

In I would say in some denominations that

3:02

was like not a big part of it in my upbringing. Yeah,

3:05

there are some Catholic churches that really go in

3:07

on that in my experience, and some that do not. So

3:10

some churches celebrated it more generally

3:13

as a season to focus on and honor

3:15

Christ. Advent marks the beginning

3:18

of the liturgical year, and depending on the

3:20

denomination, Advent celebrations

3:22

might include an Advent wreath with

3:25

those four Sundays represented. Those

3:27

Sundays usually each have their own theme.

3:30

A lot of times it's hope, peace, joy

3:32

and love, and the use of a

3:34

wreath to celebrate Advent is tied

3:36

to German Lutheran Johann Vickeran

3:38

who introduced it as a visual countdown

3:41

to Christmas in his church at a home

3:43

for boys in eighteen thirty eight, and

3:45

we'll come back to that. Advent

3:48

has been around at least since the fourth

3:50

century, when Bishop Perpetuus of

3:52

Tours set up a pre Christmas fast

3:55

as part of his church's calendar. Similar

3:58

pre Christmas observations rapidly spread

4:00

to other parts of Europe, and it took different

4:02

forms then, often dependent on location.

4:05

So there was a version of it that lasted

4:07

for six Sundays. Pope Gregory

4:09

the First also known as Gregory the Great, reduced

4:12

it to four Sundays during his papacy

4:14

that ran from five ninety to six oh four. And

4:17

while there appear to have been some efforts

4:20

to confine Advent just

4:22

to December, that timeframe was

4:24

not adopted by the Catholic Church right so

4:26

Advent can start in November. The longer

4:29

version may have been intended to include

4:31

Epiphany that would account for

4:33

that six weeks that goes past Christmas and

4:35

beyond, but that's a little bit unclear.

4:37

It doesn't really match up to some of the original

4:39

dates mentioned, but there is a pretty popular

4:42

theory that includes Epiphany, in

4:44

that early instances of Advent may have

4:46

tied not just to a Christmas countdown,

4:49

but to the preparation for the baptisms that

4:51

would normally happen to coincide with Epiphany.

4:55

The start of the Advent season, going back

4:57

to Bishop Perpetuus, appears to have initially

5:00

co incided with the death of Saint Martin

5:02

in a fast that follows the Feast of Saint Martin

5:05

that begins in early November, So that

5:07

would have initially included the stretch from

5:09

early November to Christmas, not into

5:12

January, and that might account

5:14

for the sixth Sunday length. By

5:16

the eighteenth century, the idea of Advent

5:19

had been deeply cemented as an important

5:22

part of the religious calendar. There

5:24

had also been more lore and tradition

5:27

established regarding Advent. In

5:30

the seventeen seventy five book The Movable

5:32

Feasts, Fasts and Other Annual Observances

5:34

of the Catholic Church, the reverend doctor

5:37

Alban Butler wrote this about Advent

5:39

quote, Advent is a time of

5:41

penance and devotion before Christmas,

5:43

appointed by the Church to serve as

5:45

a preparation to that great solemnity

5:47

of the birth of Christ. Festivals

5:50

were commanded by God himself and the Old

5:52

Law to commemorate his principle, benefits

5:55

and mercies, that men might be more

5:57

perfectly instructed in them, bear

5:59

them all ways in mind, be always

6:01

thankful for them, and stirred up

6:04

to dispose themselves to receive the fruits

6:06

of these wonderful mysteries. The festivals

6:09

of the New Law of Gray sought to

6:11

be celebrated with so much the greater

6:13

preparation and devotion as

6:15

the mysteries which we commemorate transcend

6:18

those of the Old Law, which, how

6:20

wonderful of ever, were no more

6:23

than weak types and figures, and

6:25

empty shadows of them. By

6:27

the time of Butler's writing, the

6:30

rules of advent timing within the Catholic

6:32

Church were firmly established, though he

6:34

notes that there continued to be differing

6:36

observations regionally. He

6:39

establishes the four Sundays of Advent

6:41

as falling from the Sunday nearest Saint

6:43

Andrew's Day on either side of it, so even

6:46

if the Sunday was before it or after it, whichever

6:49

was closest, that's where it started. He also

6:51

notes in the text that a forty day Advent

6:53

was in place at one time as a sort of parallel

6:56

to Lent, and was established in five

6:58

eighty one at the Council of Mine. That

7:01

version was forty days, no matter how many

7:03

Sundays were involved. It was also

7:05

sometimes called Saint Martin's Lent

7:08

rather than Advent. Butler

7:10

also notes that in Milan in the late eighteenth

7:12

century, the six week Advent, which

7:14

includes six Sundays, was still being

7:16

observed when he wrote this so late

7:19

eighteenth century. According

7:21

to Butler's research, in the tenth century,

7:23

Pope Nicholas the First also endorsed

7:26

the four sunday version rather than

7:28

forty days. Up to that point,

7:30

monks in England and Ireland particularly

7:33

had continued to observe the forty day

7:35

rule, fasting most of the day and

7:37

then eating one meal in the evening. Butler

7:40

concludes his discussion of the varying

7:42

advent calendar dates by saying, quote,

7:45

almost the whole Latin Church, in conformity

7:47

with the Roman has long since reduced

7:49

advent to the uniform rule of four

7:52

weeks, or at least four sundays beginning

7:54

about the end of November, from the Sunday

7:56

nearest the Feast of Saint Andrew. So

7:59

we just mentioned fasting, and even the

8:01

rules around that have been wildly different

8:03

depending on the time and place. That

8:06

Council of macall in five eighty one

8:08

that we mentioned laid out a proposed

8:10

fasting schedule of three days a week

8:12

Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the whole

8:15

forty days, and even on days

8:17

that weren't fasting days, meat

8:19

was to be avoided. Some churches

8:21

encouraged both fasting and quote

8:24

abstinence from cohabitation in the

8:26

married state. Some observances

8:29

of Advent focused more on spiritual

8:31

preparation for the Christmas holiday and

8:33

its meaning within the church, rather than

8:35

requiring physical observation through

8:38

fasting or abstinence from sexual

8:40

intercourse. Even in Butler's

8:42

book, he notes that quote in monastic

8:44

orders, the fast of Advent has always

8:47

been looked upon us less rigorous

8:49

and less solemn than that of Lent.

8:52

The bottom line is that even though there are church

8:54

recognized dates and practices of

8:57

Advent, even within any religious

8:59

denomination, different areas or even

9:01

individual churches can still

9:03

define for themselves a lot of the specifics

9:05

about how this period is observed

9:08

and celebrated. So

9:10

this is all religious history obviously that

9:12

we've been talking about, but Advent is often

9:14

marked by secular advent

9:17

calendars, So how did that start. We're

9:19

going to talk about it right after we take a quick sponsor

9:21

break. We

9:31

noted in the discussion of religious

9:34

observations of Advent that a wreath was introduced

9:36

into churches as a way to visually mark

9:38

the progression of the season and the approach

9:40

of Christmas, and in Germany

9:43

in the mid nineteenth century, this was one of several

9:45

practices that shifted the Advent to

9:47

include ways to track the countdown to

9:50

Christmas at home for children. So

9:52

sometimes marking the days that countdown

9:54

to Christmas was really simple, like families

9:57

just marking the day with chalk. I read different

9:59

accounts it said like in some families,

10:02

like they would put on the door, for example,

10:04

like all of the chalk mark for

10:06

all of the days, and they would erase one each day,

10:09

and in others they would add one each day. Like it

10:11

was a very personal way of marking it,

10:13

and everybody had their own way of doing it.

10:15

It also started to include small

10:17

physical daily items, often paired

10:19

with Bible verses to combine the religious

10:22

observation with this idea of

10:24

excitement of a visit from Santa and also

10:26

teach kids about calendars. This

10:29

started to shift from lining up with

10:31

the moving target of Advent dates

10:33

that are like the four Sundays, say and

10:35

Andrews, to just being December first

10:37

to twenty fourth. And that makes sense, particularly

10:39

when you consider that these work countdowns

10:42

that focused on children. Right, it's easy

10:44

to track Advent when the first day of it

10:46

lines up with December first and so on,

10:48

but it would surely be harder for little kids

10:50

in particular to have the calendar say November

10:52

twenty ninth, for example, when the Advent

10:55

calendar says two. So for

10:57

example, a family might be setting up a line

10:59

of candles on their mantle to be lit

11:01

in a succession as the twenty four days

11:03

from December first to December twenty

11:05

fourth unfolded. The Advent

11:08

wreath, as we noted, is credited

11:10

to Johann Heinrich Vickern in the eighteen

11:12

thirties, and this was adapted for

11:14

home use in Germany in a way

11:16

very similar to the way that we use

11:19

Advent calendars. And in this

11:21

countdown, each day a prayer

11:23

or a Bible verse was read and then a

11:25

candle was lit on the wreath. If

11:28

you haven't seen one of these before and you're like, how

11:30

would this work? The wreath

11:33

is flat on a surface or hung

11:35

from a chandelier. It's not vertically on

11:37

the wall or a door or

11:39

something like that. Versions

11:41

of the Advent wreath could vary from the

11:43

four candle one that mimicked

11:45

those that might appear in churches all the way

11:48

to twenty four day ones that mark

11:50

December one through twenty fourth.

11:52

These could be decorated with ornaments,

11:55

but the focus remained on the religious

11:57

verses and using the light the

12:00

candles to create kind of a halo. So

12:03

the Advent wreath is associated with

12:05

Protestant traditions, and this too offers

12:08

a possible insight into why they count

12:10

down from December first instead

12:12

of the religious calendar of Advent as

12:14

it related to the Catholic Church. They simply

12:16

were not governed by the Catholic Church's rules

12:19

of when Advents started, since

12:21

most of the Protestant versions of countdowns

12:23

were part of family traditions and celebrations

12:25

rather than part of any more formalized church

12:28

observants, they were also just free to do

12:30

what they wished and what made sense for their family

12:32

in this regard. Another

12:34

Protestant originated countdown convention

12:37

is the Advent tree. This is

12:39

a practice that began in eighteen forty six

12:41

in Duisburg, Germany. And once

12:43

again this was a tradition that started in a

12:46

home for wayward boys as both a

12:48

Christmas countdown and in didactic religious

12:50

practice. So a small fur

12:53

tree was planted in a pot in the home

12:55

at the beginning of Advent, and then every

12:57

day a Bible Verse was read aloud by one

12:59

of the boys with the intention that they would

13:02

all memorize it that night. And

13:04

then the next day a candle was lit

13:06

on the tree and another Bible verse

13:08

was read to be memorized, and this

13:11

daily candle and Bible verse practice

13:13

continued every day of Advent until

13:15

the tree was decorated and Advent ended.

13:18

This practice was picked up in private homes

13:21

as well, and a business grew out of

13:23

it as printers started producing heavy

13:25

paper or cardboard ornaments that had

13:27

Bible verses printed on them and

13:30

even stars to top the tree.

13:33

So to be clear, this Advent tree was

13:35

not something used instead of a

13:37

Christmas tree. A lot of times

13:40

the two would be alongside one another

13:42

as kind of a commingling of Christmas

13:44

decora and traditions. Yeah,

13:46

one rite up that I read kind

13:49

of made it sound like you did the Advent

13:51

tree and then when it was done, you carried

13:54

that one into the room with the Christmas tree.

13:56

But I wasn't sure if that was a translation

13:58

issue. It seems

14:01

like it would be a pain in the neck to move a tree with candles

14:03

on it, so I think that is what the problem was.

14:06

Austria developed its own variation

14:08

on the Advent calendar, called a Heaven Ladder.

14:11

This version walked children down the

14:13

ladder as the days progressed, so each wrung

14:15

was a day and it was intended to represent

14:17

the way that God descends to earth to be

14:20

present with humanity on Christmas.

14:22

There were also candles that could

14:24

be used in some celebrations, intended

14:27

to be burned only a specific amount

14:29

each day. That was in both

14:31

Austria and other European countries. There are

14:33

also, we should say, a lot

14:35

of different ways to count down Advent that we're

14:37

not even touching on because some of them probably

14:39

aren't even documented as personal ways

14:41

to do it. The German Christmas

14:44

Museum describes Advent calendars

14:46

this way, which Holly found delightful.

14:48

Quote. Advent or Christmas calendars

14:50

are tools devised by adults for children

14:53

to make the remaining time until Christmas

14:55

Eve countable and to stir up

14:58

anticipation. Their

15:00

English translation of their page on Advent

15:02

calendars, so Holly

15:05

is hopeful that the German language version

15:07

is just as charming. I

15:10

don't know why. It's like it's a tool for

15:12

kids to make them happy, keep them

15:15

occupied. We noted

15:18

that the days were sometimes marked really simply

15:20

in advent countdowns, like with chalk. But

15:22

another form of simple advent calendar

15:24

was mentioned in an eighteen fifty one children's

15:27

book about Christmas by German social

15:29

activist Elise Averdick. In

15:32

that book, a little girl in her mother marked the days

15:34

by hanging pictures on the wall related

15:36

to the story of Christmas, and a lot of homes

15:38

did this for decades.

15:40

Advent calendars for home use were also

15:43

homemade. I don't want to make it sound

15:45

like that's over. There are still people that make homemade Advent

15:47

calendars, and so they

15:49

can take whatever form the creativity of

15:51

the adults involved desire. The

15:54

first printed Advent calendar was made

15:56

in nineteen hundred in Munich and

15:58

told the story of Santa Claus. But this

16:00

is a very small run. Two years

16:02

later there was a commercially made Advent

16:04

clock. This was not really

16:07

a clock, but it was two printouts of

16:09

clockfaces in which each of the twelve

16:11

hours on the first image corresponded

16:13

to December one through twelve, and

16:15

the twelve hours on the second image corresponded

16:18

to the days thirteen

16:21

to twenty four. So

16:23

each day the hands of the clock this

16:25

paper clock could be advanced as Christmas

16:27

could grew nearer. Because

16:29

that nineteen hundred Santa Claus Advent

16:32

calendar appears not to have been widely

16:34

released, there's another point

16:37

at which the Advent calendar is often

16:39

said to have been invented. In

16:41

the early nineteen hundreds, a German printer

16:44

named Gerhard Lang is credited

16:46

with printing the first commercial Advent

16:48

calendar. According to the legend,

16:51

this was inspired by his mother's practice

16:53

of sewing twenty four cookies

16:55

into a box lid for him every

16:57

year as a child, to be opened day

17:00

by day as Christmas approached.

17:02

And if you're wondering how cookies would

17:05

survive twenty four days involved in

17:07

this countdown, these were allegedly

17:09

Vibela cookies, which are more like biscuits

17:12

that share characteristics with meringues

17:14

or the cookie part of a mackerel,

17:17

so they were probably okay

17:19

for a few weeks. The last few probably

17:22

chewier then that would

17:24

be freshly made. Because

17:27

Lang's not only made a

17:29

widely distributed calendar, he continued

17:32

to print new ones for decades.

17:34

His name is the one that's most associated

17:37

with the beginnings of advent

17:39

calendars as a consumer product.

17:42

There is not a load of

17:44

readily available information about

17:46

Gerhard Lang. If you search his name,

17:48

a few examples come up over and over, none

17:50

of which are him. One is a printer from

17:53

Frankfurt who was born in nineteen twenty one

17:55

and is linked to the beginning of font design, which is

17:57

pretty fascinating. Another was

17:59

a botanist born in nineteen twenty four, and yet

18:01

another was a brewer and Democratic State committeeman

18:04

who lived in Buffalo, New York. None of

18:06

those are the Advent calendar guy. So

18:08

we don't know much about the life of Gerhard

18:10

Lang, who is sometimes called the inventor

18:13

of the advent calendar. But what we do

18:15

know is that he eventually was made a partner

18:17

in a publishing company called Reichold

18:19

and Lang. The date that

18:22

Lang published his first calendar is different

18:24

depending on what source you look at. Some

18:26

say nineteen oh eight, others placed the

18:28

date earlier in the nineteen hundreds. There's

18:31

a children's book called Waiting for Christmas

18:33

from two thousand and six that shares an

18:35

imagined version of Gerhard Lang

18:37

as a child learning about Advent through

18:40

his mother's cookie countdown. The

18:42

book says the cookies were Lebkitchen, So

18:44

who knows that book included

18:47

the nineteen oh eight date, and it

18:49

might be where other recent accounts picked

18:51

that year up. Lang's collaborator

18:54

on several of these Advent calendars was

18:56

an illustrator named Richard Ernst Kepler.

18:59

You can find some of Kepler's early Advent

19:01

calendar illustrations for Laying online,

19:03

and one of these is from nineteen oh three, and it's

19:06

titled in the Land of the Christ Child,

19:08

and it features in an array of scenes that all depict

19:10

children, either representing moments from the

19:12

life of Christ or showing

19:14

some imagery that's commonly associated

19:16

with the more secular aspects of Christmas,

19:19

like nutcrackers and dolls and other toys.

19:22

These calendars started out just as paper

19:24

calendars that had a degree of activity

19:26

to them. You could open a little window

19:28

and see a Bible verse, or you could

19:30

paste an image onto the square

19:33

that noted the day. The

19:35

original edition of In the Land of the Christ

19:37

Child, for example, wasn't even sold on its

19:39

own, It was an insert in a newspaper.

19:43

It was the Stuttgarter new Tagblat.

19:45

There were two sheets that made up the calendar,

19:48

and then after reading the Bible verse framed

19:50

in each square of the calendar, kids could cut

19:52

out the corresponding art to paste over

19:54

it. The National Museum of Germany

19:56

recognizes nineteen oh three as

19:58

the year of the first advent calendar

20:01

because of that newspaper distributed start

20:03

of Lang's long career, making them

20:06

Another reason the nineteen oh eight origin

20:08

date comes up is because although Lang started

20:11

before that date, it wasn't

20:13

until nineteen oh eight that he was actually producing

20:15

advent calendars that sold just on

20:18

their own outside of

20:20

some other publication. Over

20:22

time, the Lang Advent calendars

20:24

became more complex and they started to

20:26

look a little more like the ones that you could purchase

20:28

today. If your family

20:30

has one of those calendars, that's like part of the family

20:33

tradition that hangs on a door with pockets

20:35

or some other interactive feature. Those door

20:37

calendars are an idea that came from Lang.

20:40

Similarly, the first Advent calendar with

20:42

a chocolate behind each door is credited

20:44

to him, although his first one did not have the chocolate

20:47

included. It was just set up so that

20:49

parents could fill it up for their kids to then

20:51

have them. This is a good way to get

20:54

around the idea to sidestep the problem

20:56

of chocolate getting stale on shelves

20:58

because it goes out onto the show shelf sometime

21:00

in July. One

21:03

of his calendars, which sounds very quaint, was

21:05

a small cardboard house, and each day

21:07

of the Advent countdown, one of the windows

21:10

would be opened, and then when all of the windows

21:12

and finally on the last day, the door was

21:14

open. The calendar had become a

21:16

lantern and it was meant to put a candle inside.

21:19

He created the first Advent calendar for

21:22

blind consumers in nineteen thirty

21:25

and by the nineteen thirties Advent calendars

21:27

had become very popular in Germany

21:29

and they were a pretty standard part of a lot of families

21:32

holiday traditions. They had

21:34

also become pretty popular by that time in Great

21:36

Britain because Lang had started shipping them

21:38

there in the years following World War One.

21:41

During the time that Lang was making calendars,

21:43

the Sank Johannis Printing Company

21:45

also started making Advent calendars.

21:48

Sank Johannas started printing in the nineteen

21:50

twenties and sometimes is credited with

21:52

the openable doors on Advent

21:55

calendars, although Lang

21:57

also gets the credit for that in a lot of sources.

21:59

Yeah, it's hard to pin down. World

22:02

War two, though, put the brakes on the printing

22:04

of Advent calendars, as it put their Greeks

22:06

on a lot of things. Not long after the

22:08

war started, the rising prices on paper

22:11

products meant that reich Holden Lang

22:13

just could not stay in business, and

22:15

then paper goods were also rationed. Then

22:18

no illustrated calendars were allowed to

22:20

be printed under the Third Reich, at least

22:22

not any that were not Nazi produced and

22:24

intended to indoctrinate children in a Nazi

22:27

ideology. New Advent

22:29

calendars just simply could not exist

22:31

during World War II. But when

22:34

the war ended, the Advent calendar

22:36

was one of those things that pretty quickly bounced

22:38

back. The companies that had

22:40

survived the war were able to get back into

22:42

printing production relatively quickly, and

22:45

this also was probably motivated by

22:47

a desire to recapture a sliver of

22:49

normalcy for children in Germany post

22:51

war, and there were Advent calendars available

22:54

by Christmas nineteen forty five. US

22:57

soldiers stationed in Europe bought them

22:59

and then brought them home when their tours were

23:01

over. One of the major sellers

23:03

of Advent calendars after the war was

23:05

Richard Selmer, who started producing Advent

23:08

calendars in nineteen forty five. Selmer's

23:11

first calendar was called The Little Town,

23:13

sometimes also appearing in print as

23:15

the Little Christmas Town, and it featured

23:17

a serene looking village in the winter kind

23:20

of a balm. After the war. Incidentally,

23:23

you can still buy the Little Town calendars

23:25

from Selmer's company, which today is called

23:27

Selmer Verlag. As their

23:29

offerings have expanded to include a

23:32

wide variety of Advent calendars.

23:34

Selmer Verlag reports that they sell as

23:36

many for adults as they do for children.

23:39

Her website also has photos of some

23:41

of their Advent calendars from decades ago.

23:44

Selmer's real genius, though, was expanding

23:46

his business into the international market,

23:49

seeing how eager visitors to Germany

23:52

were for Advent calendars, who started distributing

23:54

in North America in nineteen forty six,

23:57

and one of the pivotal moments in the US

24:00

that is cited as giving Advent calendars

24:02

a huge boost was a photo

24:04

that was published during the Eisenhower presidency.

24:07

That photo was of Dwight D. Eisenhower

24:10

opening an Advent calendar with his grandchildren.

24:13

There were also some additional photos of the kids

24:15

holding up the calendar and smiling. Those

24:18

photographs ran in Newsweek in nineteen

24:20

fifty four, and it made the novelty

24:22

of an Advent calendar something that a lot

24:25

of US families wanted in their own

24:27

homes. A photo, though,

24:29

was no accident. The photo op

24:31

was intended to promote the sales of the calendars

24:33

to raise money for the National Epilepsy

24:36

League, and the calendar that was photographed

24:38

with the Eisenhower family that was

24:40

Richard Selmer's Little Christmas Town. Selmer

24:43

had arranged for the calendars to be sold for charity

24:46

because he knew that it would help establish

24:48

the United States as a market for Advent

24:50

calendars for years, and he was

24:53

of course correct. In

24:55

nineteen seventy one, Cadbury introduced

24:58

its first Advent calendar filled with Cadbury

25:00

chocolate santas, although that didn't catch

25:02

on immediately, and the company didn't

25:05

always offer Advent calendars because

25:07

they didn't always sell. By the nineteen

25:09

nineties, though, they had become a regular

25:11

part of the annual product offerings.

25:14

Today. One of the interesting ways

25:16

that Advent calendars have evolved is into

25:19

this unique space of

25:21

being a marketing tool. So more

25:23

and more companies have custom calendars

25:25

printed just to market their products, and

25:27

this can be a giveaway, so like think

25:29

the kind of calendar mailers you might sometimes

25:31

receive from companies in the winter

25:34

to promote their offerings or and

25:36

this is really fascinating to me, there's

25:38

this more subtle aspect where they become products

25:40

themselves. So when consumers

25:43

purchase Advent calendars that are made

25:45

by companies because they're perhaps fans

25:47

of that company, they're also essentially

25:49

getting samples of products that might lead

25:51

them to buy more. And because

25:53

Advent calendars are also marketed as

25:55

gifts, it's kind of like consumers are

25:58

paying a company for a gift they

26:00

will give someone else that will help market

26:02

that company's products to the recipient. We

26:05

mentioned a moment ago that Advent calendars

26:07

have become not just a way to count down to Christmas,

26:10

but also are now gifts themselves,

26:12

and there's truly something for

26:14

everyone. There are socks.

26:18

Every ip you can think of probably

26:20

has an Advent calendar associated

26:22

with it. Another evolution

26:25

of the concept of Advent calendars is

26:27

like virtual digital calendars, and sometimes

26:29

these are packaged as a physical

26:31

item, but every day's

26:33

reveal is something that you have to open online.

26:36

Yeah. Sometimes it's like the music download

26:38

calendar and you just get a new song every day, like

26:41

the There have been so many creative iterations

26:44

of how to use this concept. The

26:47

largest Advent calendar on record, according

26:49

to the Guinness Book of Records, was built in two

26:51

thousand and seven at Saint Pancras station in

26:53

London as part of the station's renovation celebration.

26:57

That was seventy one meters that's two hundred

26:59

and thirty two feet and eleven inches high

27:01

and twenty three meters as seventy five

27:03

feet five inches wide. I

27:06

will say I have seen some other Advent

27:08

calendars that looked like they might be more giant

27:10

than this like, there's a town in Germany where their town

27:12

hall is made into a giant Advent calendar

27:14

every year. And I'm not sure it's not bigger than this, but this

27:17

is the Guinness World record holder. But

27:19

this giant Advent calendar at Saint Pancras

27:22

station had digital windows.

27:24

The entire thing was really a fundraiser for

27:26

the Great Ormond Street Hospital charity. Maybe

27:29

the most startling of all the advent calendars

27:32

that's turned up in Holly's research was one

27:34

that was offered by Porsche in twenty

27:36

ten, and there were only five of them made available,

27:38

one for each continent where the company had

27:41

businesses. The physical

27:43

calendar itself was made of brushed

27:45

aluminum and as tall as a

27:47

person. The

27:49

treats inside each revial were completely

27:52

over the top. The recipient of this would get

27:54

a watch one day, gold

27:56

sunglasses another. There was even

27:58

a custom designed kitchen and custom

28:01

yacht. Each of these

28:03

Advent calendars, sold in twenty

28:05

ten, cost one million dollars.

28:11

One of the most beautiful advent calendars,

28:13

in my opinion, that has been published

28:15

since twenty twelve is the Atlantic's

28:17

annual Hubble Space Telescope Advent

28:20

Calendar. So This online outlet

28:22

posts a new image from the Telescope each

28:24

day, selecting some of the most spectacular

28:27

and fascinating photos of space that humans

28:29

have ever seen. The Advent

28:31

Calendar has also manifested as a community

28:33

event in some places. So every day people

28:36

gather at a spot to see an

28:38

actual thing like a storefront

28:40

window or a church door or et

28:42

cetera, something that's been decorated to

28:44

mark the day. Some of these are religious,

28:47

some are more secular. It's a neat way

28:49

that's sort of taken something

28:52

that's become very commercial and maybe

28:54

kitchen some ways to more bring people

28:56

together. Yeah,

28:58

Advent calendars. Listen, we can talk about having calendars

29:01

a lot behind the scenes because I love them.

29:04

Uh. And now we're gonna pop over to

29:07

listener mail. Hey, this

29:09

listener mail is from our listener Rebecca, and

29:11

she is writing in response to our episode

29:14

about Gin based cocktail history. She

29:17

writes, Hey, y'all, I have started to write so many

29:19

times, but the Gin Cocktails episode finally

29:21

made me follow through. I was raised

29:23

by a very proper Southern Baptist Mama.

29:26

Yes I am that Southern. My parents

29:28

were and will always be Mama and Daddy

29:30

They weren't exactly teetotalers, but alcohol

29:32

just wasn't a thing in our home when I was growing

29:35

up, like everybody else in North Georgia.

29:37

They both had uncles who made

29:39

liquor or were known to frequent

29:41

the best moonshiners when they got a thirst.

29:44

My parents married in the sixties and started

29:46

to move in circles where an occasional cocktail

29:48

was served. A lady in town who was

29:50

known for exceptional good graces and manners

29:52

advised Mama to order a Tom Collins

29:55

and sip it very slow, and

29:57

throughout their social lives that became her go

29:59

to. In my college days, I had

30:01

the requisite fun that comes with matriculating

30:03

in a southern university town. Go dogs.

30:06

But if my parents knew, they never let on. I'm

30:09

going to pick up this email from Holly and

30:11

say after graduation, Mama sat me down

30:13

and said, now, when you're at a cocktail party

30:15

or a work function, order a Tom Collins and sip

30:17

it really slow. She had no idea

30:20

that I was much more educated when it came to cocktail

30:22

choices, and I let it stay that way

30:24

for the most part. Mama passed away in February

30:27

the episode brought me a sweet memory of a story

30:29

I've shared many times through the years.

30:32

Sometime soon, I planned to have a Tom

30:34

Collins in memory of both my parents.

30:36

I don't have a pet right now, so I don't

30:38

have a picture to share. I tried to

30:40

find one of Blackie, mama's last cat. She

30:43

showed up one Saturday morning and didn't leave for eighteen

30:45

years. Daddy was a dog person, but

30:47

that cat stole his heart too. Thanks

30:50

for all the great and hard work. I hope y'all

30:52

do a live show in Atlanta someday soon so I

30:54

can meet you both in person. Rebecca

30:58

Tracy picked that up because I got real weak about

31:00

it. So

31:03

I also read this email this morning, and

31:05

it reminded me earlier

31:08

in my life, when I was in

31:10

college. I think I

31:12

went to the beach with my mom and a couple

31:14

of her sisters, and they wanted

31:17

to make a thing they can they typically consumed

31:19

on their beach trips, which they described as wine

31:21

coolers. It

31:23

was diet mountain dew mixed with white sefidel,

31:26

and they

31:30

were having trouble getting the

31:32

cork out of the white zefandel,

31:35

and I went and effortlessly

31:40

took care of it, and there was a

31:42

shared moment among my mom and

31:45

her sisters in which they just

31:47

sort of wordlessly acknowledged that I,

31:49

their daughter slash niece, who they still saw as

31:52

a child, knew how

31:54

to operate a corkscrew. I

31:57

love it. I love it. Good

32:00

memories. We'll talk about that

32:03

Diamount and Duo White z Evanel in a minute

32:05

when we do behind the scenes. I have some thoughts,

32:08

So if again, thank you so

32:10

much for this email, and I want to send

32:12

my condolences. You got me all choked up. It's so

32:15

sweet. If you would like to email us,

32:17

you can do that at History Podcast

32:19

at iHeartRadio dot com. You can also

32:21

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32:23

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32:26

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32:28

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32:36

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