Elf Story

by Carma Wadley
Deseret News, 12/22/02

Any child can tell you how it is: Santa Claus has a huge workshop at the North Pole, where he spends the year supervising a large crew of toy-making elves.

But few adults can tell you exactly how elves came to be part of the Christmas story.

We can trace the evolution of Santa from the good bishop Nicholas in Asia Minor, who spent his life doing such helpful deeds that he earned sainthood, with a special calling to protect sailors, unmarried women and children.

We know that when settlers came to the New World, they brought their own traditions - including that of St. Nicholas, Kris Kringle or Sinterklass - with them.

But when Clement Clark Moore wrote his now-famous poem in 1822 about  "A Visit From St. Nick," he characterized Santa himself as a "jolly old elf" small enough to bound down chimneys. Since then, Santa has not only gotten bigger himself, but he has acquired a magical bunch of elfin helpers. And for that, it seems, we can thank not only folklore but advertising.

Like many parts of the Christmas story, the elves have roots in pagan customs that were incorporated into the celebration. The gnome-like creatures are a part of Scandinavian lore, where they served as mostly benevolent helpers.

In his book "Christmas Treevia," D. Peter Harrington notes: "In Norway, Christmas elves were called "Julenisse." They are legendary creatures who are given a bowl of rommegrot on Christmas Eve, They are thought to live in the barn and help the entire household throughout the year. It is thought that this is the beginning of the myth that Santa Claus has elves to help him make toys."

Still, it took awhile for them to make an appearance in the Santa legend as it developed in America. We can thank Washington Irving (of "Rip Van Winkle" fame) for getting it started. In his "History of New York," published in 1809, Irving has St. Nick flying over snowy New York on St. Nicholas Day, dropping gifts down chimneys. Moore picked up on that idea, exchanging the wagon for a reindeer-drawn sleigh.

Our image of this Santa was solidified some 40 years later, when political cartoonist Thomas Nast illustrated Moore's poem with drawings of the "chubby and plump" figure, giving him the furred red cap, black belt and jovial expression we know and love.

As cartoonist for the influential Harper's Weekly for 22 years, Nast also drew a Santa for each Christmas issue of the magazine, which "he claimed was a welcome relied from the relentless pressure of political cartooning," Cynthia Hart, John Grossman and Priscilla Dunhill say in their book "Joy to the World: A Victorian Christmas."

In some of his drawings, Nast slipped in a few little "brownies" as Santa's helpers.

In December 1882, Harper's Monthly published a story of a kingdom of dwarfs that lived at the North Pole — and claimed that their shenanigans in the kitchen were responsible for the northern lights. Stories like this may have added to the notion that Santa lived in that arctic region. By the 1890s, he seems to be firmly entrenched there.

Katharine Lee Bates (of "America The Beautiful" renown) brought Mrs. Claus into the picture with a storybook published in 1899 called "Goody Santa Claus on a Sleigh Ride." (In those days, "goody" was a common contraction for "goodwife.")

In the mid-1940s, George Hinke, an illustrator for the Ideals Publishing Co., added to our image of both Santa and his elves. His book "Jolly Old Santa Claus" features a variety of scenes from the North Pole and showed what he called "brownies" feeding reindeer, helping with toys, even having a pillow fight.

"He did a marvelous job of creating this whole wonderful world," says Patricia Pingry, publisher of Ideals. The magazine began publication in 1944, and Hinke joined the staff in 1945. "He was German, so a lot of his paintings were a combination of German traditions and new customs he found in America. He was one of the first to paint in color."

"Jolly Old Santa Claus" has been re-released several times by Ideals, which is now owned by Guideposts. "In 1996, a new version came out where we took out the smoking. We can't have brownies doing that these days," says Pingry.

Illustrator Haddon Sundblom is another contributor to our current popular image of both Santa and his elves. From the early 1930s to the mid-1960s, Sundblom did a yearly Santa advertisement for the Coca-Cola Co. and sometimes incorporated elves in the drawings.

"The full-page ads were reproduced on the back covers of two national magazines," Kathleen Paton says in her book "Santa." "Sundblom's famous image of Santa picked up where Thomas Nast's left off, firmly establishing the definitive 20th-century Santa."

See also: Santa's Elves
Elias Elf Finds His Specialty