Christmas in Minnesota: A celebration in memories, stories, and recipes of seasons past

by Marilyn Ziebarth (Editor), Brian Horrigan (Editor)

Overview

Like the warmth of a cabin fireplace and the twinkle of lights along the edge of a frozen lake, Christmas in Minnesota evokes memories of holidays long ago.
Beloved Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz recalls the boyhood Christmas when he learned how to sketch a winter pond with a hole in the ice. A Swedish traveler in the 1870s details the Christmas he spent with a welcoming family in a cozy sod house on the prairie. Jon Hassler presents the tale of an estranged father struggling to reconnect with his son during this time of togetherness. Playwright Syl Jones recalls his dread that "a fat white man in a red suit was coming, and if you didn’t act just right there would be hell to pay." Maud Hart Lovelace features her famous children's book trio, Betsy, Tacy, and Tib, in a story about their trip to the toy shop to buy dime ornaments for the tree. Humorist Louie Anderson yanks readers right into the middle of Christmas-tree shopping with his dad, a man bent on outsmarting the salesman to get the best tree at the cheapest price.
The state's beloved writers gather here to share warm and spirited memories and stories from Minnesota holidays past.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781681341422
Publisher:	Minnesota Historical Society Press
Publication date:	10/29/2019
Pages:	220
Sales rank:	290,241
Product dimensions:	7.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Marilyn Ziebarth is coauthor of The Life and Times of Rosie the Riveter. She lives in Berkeley, California.

Brian Horrigan, a longtime exhibit curator at the Minnesota Historical Society, lives in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Read an Excerpt

The Christmas That Almost Got Stolen By Charles M. Schulz It is probably impossible to discuss holidays and children without talking about school. No matter how much meaning we try to put into holiday ceremonies, children will always look to these times primarily as a reprieve from schoolwork. When I recall my childhood in St. Paul, Minnesota, the memories invariably are memories of school. I was not overfond of the class routines, but I must admit there was always one project that I enjoyed. Just as English class meant the inevitable theme “What I Did on My Summer Vacation,” art class always included a project requiring us to draw our friends engaged in some form of winter activity. Now, in Minnesota this meant that we drew a group of children skating on a pond. This did not mean that any of us had actually experienced such an activity; we were city kids, and very few of us had ever seen a pond that had frozen hard enough to be skated on. But we always tried to depict these scenes, and it was a certainty that every child included a hole in the ice out of which projected a sign that read “Danger.” Most likely we had seen these in comic strips. I noticed that all the kids had trouble drawing those holes in the ice. Somehow they just looked like black spots. My own interest in cartooning led me to discover that by drawing a double line in the ice, one could depict the thickness of that ice. I was very proud when the teacher came around and complimented me on my discovery.

Table of Contents

1 Finding Christmas [MS p. 1] Christmas Chronicles 000 Hugo Nisbeth Christmas Eve in a Sod House 000 Mary Dodge Woodward “No sound of joyous Christmas bells” 00 Works Progress Administration “In the American fashion” 000 Melvin L. Frank “Screaming their excited delight” 000 Justine Kerfoot Christmas on the Gunflint 000 Florence Page Jaques “A Christmas tree for birds” 000 Oliver Towne (Gareth Hiebert) Christmas Eve in the City 000 Wendell Anderson “Once again it is Christmas” 000 Robert Treuer “Where are the trees?” 000 2 Celebrating the Holidays [MS p. 19] Faith Sullivan “They want to hear a story” 000 Roger MacDonald “Like the haunting croon of Goodman’s clarinet” 000 Karlis Kaufmanis The Star of Bethlehem 000 Lorna Landvik “This is my favorite part” 000 Garrison Keillor Celebrating Christmas in Lake Wobegon 000 Charles Flandrau “Christmas . . . is really a terrible day” 000 Charles M. Schulz “Off the hook” 000 Cathy Mauk “It’s the light” 000 Jonis Agee The Christmas Question 000 Lee Mero Christmas in the City 000 3 Coming Home [p. 40] F. Scott Fitzgerald “My Middle West” 000 Laura Ingalls Wilder The Christmas Horses 000 Walter O’Meara “You could hear sleigh bells” 000 Jerry Fearing “Closer to the ground” 000 Bill Holm “My December duty” 000 Louie Anderson ‘“How much for this tree without limbs” 000 Barton Sutter Afterthoughts on Christmas Trees 000 Emily Carter Cold Feet 000 4 The Giving Season [p. 62] Beatrice Fines The Gift of Oranges 000 Maud Hart Lovelace Betsy, Tacy, and Tib Go Christmas Shopping 000 An Anonymous Lady What a Christmas Shopper Found 000 Harrison Salisbury “A day of excitement, of joy” 000 Celia Tauer “I dreamed I was in New Ulm” 000 Evelyn Fairbanks Daddy’s Gift 000 Cheri Register “One more saving grace” 000 Sam Cook In Stitches 000 Susan Allen Toth A Cut-Glass Christmas 000 Maura Stanton Gifts 000 Samuel Hynes “Promises of bright, warm days coming” 000 Kevin Kling “Something ‘different’” 000 5 Eating and Making Merry [p. 89] Vilhelm Moberg “A Christmas for their souls” 000 Civil War soldiers “Strange and unusual holidays” 000 Otis Terpening “Come and eat, eat” 000 Shirley Schoonover “Celebration and saunas” 000 Nick Fauchald The Kookie Never Krumbles 000 Helen Hoover Dinner Guests 000 Susan Hauser Coins of the Realm 000 Colleen Kruse Mickey’s Diner 000 A Minnesota Christmas Eve Feast 6 Family Matters [p. 105] Syl Jones Santi Claw 000 Sinclair Lewis Carol’s Christmas 000 Carol Bly An Adolescent’s Christmas 000 Michael Fedo “Everybody smile” 000 William Kent Krueger Missing Home 000 Robert Bly Driving My Parents Home at Christmas 000 Jon Hassler “How am I doing, Dad?” 000 Christmas letters “I will never forget” 000