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Twas The Night Before Christmas
"A Visit from St. Nicholas", routinely referred to as "The Night Before Christmas" and "Twas the Night Before Christmas" from its first line, is a poem first published anonymously under the title "Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas" in 1823. Authorship has been attributed to Clement Clarke Moore, who claimed authorship in 1837, but it has also been suggested that Henry Livingston Jr. may have written it. The poem has been called "arguably the best-known verses ever written by an American" Burrows, Edwin G. & Wallace, Mike. '' Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898''. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999. pp. 462–63 and is largely responsible for some of the conceptions of Santa Claus from the mid-19th century to today. It has had a massive effect on the history of Christmas gift-giving. Before the poem gained wide popularity, American ideas had varied considerably about Saint Nicholas and other Christmastide visitors. "A Visit from St. Nicholas" eventually was set t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Santa Claus's Reindeer
In traditional Western festive legend and popular culture, Santa Claus's reindeer are said to pull a sleigh through the night sky to help Santa Claus deliver gifts to children on Christmas Eve. While various legends offer differing details, the 1823 poem '' A Visit from St. Nicholas'' (usually attributed to Clement Clarke Moore) has proved the most enduring. It describes Santa's sleigh being pulled by a team of eight reindeer, best known as Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, and Blitzen. The popularity of the 1939 story " Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer", and the 1949 Christmas song of the same name, has resulted in Rudolph often being included among the team. Origins and history Single reindeer The first reference to Santa's sleigh being pulled by a reindeer appears in " Old Santeclaus with Much Delight", an 1821 illustrated children's poem published in New York. The names of the author and the illustrator are not known. The poem, with eight colored ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christmas Stockings
A Christmas stocking is an empty sock or sock-shaped bag that is hung on Saint Nicholas Day or Christmas Eve so that Saint Nicholas (or the related figures of Santa Claus and Father Christmas) can fill it with small toys, candy, fruit, coins or other small gifts when he arrives. These small items are often referred to as stocking stuffers or stocking fillers. The tradition of the Christmas stocking is thought to originate from the life of Saint Nicholas. In some Christmas stories, the contents of the Christmas stocking are the only toys the child receives at Christmas from Santa Claus; in other stories (and in tradition), some presents are also wrapped up in wrapping paper and placed under the Christmas tree. Tradition in Western culture threatens that a child who behaves badly during the year will receive only a piece or pile of coal. Some people even put their Christmas stocking by their bedposts so Santa Claus can fill it by the bed while they sleep. History Christmas stockin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joe Nickell
Joe Herman Nickell (December 1, 1944 – March 4, 2025) was an American skeptic and investigator of the paranormal. Nickell was a senior research fellow for the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry and wrote regularly for their journal, '' Skeptical Inquirer''. He was also an associate dean of the Center for Inquiry Institute. He was the author or editor of over 30 books. Among his career highlights, Nickell helped expose the James Maybrick "Jack the Ripper Diary" as a hoax. In 2002, Nickell was one of a number of experts asked by scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. to evaluate the authenticity of the manuscript of Hannah Crafts' '' The Bondwoman's Narrative'' (1853–1860), possibly the first novel by an African-American woman. At the request of document dealer and historian Seth Keller, Nickell analyzed documentation in the dispute over the authorship of "The Night Before Christmas", ultimately supporting the Clement Clarke Moore claim. Background Joe Nickell was the son of J. W ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Content Analysis
Content analysis is the study of documents and communication artifacts, known as texts e.g. photos, speeches or essays. Social scientists use content analysis to examine patterns in communication in a replicable and systematic manner. One of the key advantages of using content analysis to analyse social phenomena is their non-invasive nature, in contrast to simulating social experiences or collecting survey answers. Practices and philosophies of content analysis vary between academic disciplines. They all involve systematic reading or observation of texts or artifacts which are assigned labels (sometimes called codes) to indicate the presence of interesting, meaningful pieces of content. By systematically labeling the content of a set of texts, researchers can analyse patterns of content quantitatively using statistical methods, or use qualitative methods to analyse meanings of content within texts. Computers are increasingly used in content analysis to automate the labeling ( ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Donald Wayne Foster
Donald Wayne Foster (born 1950) is a retired professor of English at Vassar College in New York. He is known for his work dealing with various issues of Shakespearean authorship through textual analysis. He has also applied these techniques in attempting to uncover mysterious authors of some high-profile contemporary texts. As several of these were in the context of criminal investigations, Foster was sometimes labeled a "forensic linguist". He has been inactive in this arena, however, since Condé Nast settled a defamation lawsuit brought against one of his publications for an undisclosed sum in 2007. Shakespearean scholarship Foster first achieved notice for addressing the mystery of the dedication of Shakespeare's sonnets. In the edition published by Thomas Thorpe, a dedication appears to "Mr. W.H." as the "onlie begetter" of the sonnets, and the identity of W.H. has aroused much speculation over the years. While in graduate school at the University of California, Santa Barbara, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lightning
Lightning is a natural phenomenon consisting of electrostatic discharges occurring through the atmosphere between two electrically charged regions. One or both regions are within the atmosphere, with the second region sometimes occurring on the land, ground. Following the lightning, the regions become partially or wholly electrically neutralized. Lightning involves a near-instantaneous release of energy on a scale averaging between 200 megajoules and 7 gigajoules. The air around the lightning flash rapidly heats to temperatures of about . There is an emission of electromagnetic radiation across a wide range of wavelengths, some visible as a bright flash. Lightning also causes thunder, a sound from the shock wave which develops as heated gases in the vicinity of the discharge experience a sudden increase in pressure. The most common occurrence of a lightning event is known as a thunderstorm, though they can also commonly occur in other types of energetic weather systems, such ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thunder
Thunder is the sound caused by lightning. Depending upon the distance from and nature of the lightning, it can range from a long, low rumble to a sudden, loud crack. The sudden increase in temperature and hence pressure caused by the lightning produces rapid Thermal expansion, expansion of the air in the path of a Lightning strike, lightning bolt. In turn, this expansion of air creates a Shock wave, sonic shock wave, often referred to as a "thunderclap" or "peal of thunder". The scientific study of thunder is known as ''brontology'' and the irrational fear (phobia) of thunder is called ''brontophobia''. Etymology The ''d'' in Modern English ''thunder'' (from earlier Old English ''þunor'') is epenthetic, and is now found as well in Modern Dutch ''donder'' (cf. Middle Dutch ''donre''; also Old Norse ''þorr'', Old Frisian ''þuner'', Old High German ''donar'', all ultimately descended from Proto-Germanic *''þunraz''). In Latin the term was ''tonare'' "to thunder". The name of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dutch Language
Dutch ( ) is a West Germanic languages, West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, spoken by about 25 million people as a first language and 5 million as a second language and is the List of languages by total number of speakers, third most spoken Germanic language. In Europe, Dutch is the native language of most of the population of the Netherlands and Flanders (which includes 60% of the population of Belgium). "1% of the EU population claims to speak Dutch well enough in order to have a conversation." (page 153). Dutch was one of the official languages of South Africa until 1925, when it was replaced by Afrikaans, a separate but partially Mutual intelligibility, mutually intelligible daughter language of Dutch. Afrikaans, depending on the definition used, may be considered a sister language, spoken, to some degree, by at least 16 million people, mainly in South Africa and Namibia, and evolving from Cape Dutch dialects. In South America, Dutch is the native l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edmund Clarence Stedman
Edmund Clarence Stedman (October 8, 1833January 18, 1908) was an American poet, critic, essayist, banker, and scientist. Early life Edmund Clarence Stedman was born in Hartford, Connecticut, on October 8, 1833; his father, Major Edmund Burke Stedman died of tuberculosis two years later in December 1835. By the following spring, his mother Elizabeth Clementine Stedman moved the boy and his younger brother to Plainfield, New Jersey, to live with her wealthy father, David Low Dodge. Dodge, a Calvinist and pacifist, was strict, did not want to use his finances to support his grandchildren, and often physically punished the boys for bad behavior. Mrs. Stedman sold poems and stories to magazines including '' Graham's Magazine'', '' Sartain's Magazine'', '' The Knickerbocker'', and '' Godey's Lady's Book'' for income. Eventually, the children were taken in by their paternal grandfather, Griffin Stedman, and his brother James in Norwich, Connecticut. Stedman enrolled in Yale Unive ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Washington Irving
Washington Irving (April 3, 1783 – November 28, 1859) was an American short-story writer, essayist, biographer, historian, and diplomat of the early 19th century. He wrote the short stories "Rip Van Winkle" (1819) and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" (1820), both of which appear in his collection ''The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.'' His historical works include biographies of Oliver Goldsmith, Muhammad, and George Washington, as well as several histories of 15th-century Spain that deal with subjects such as the Alhambra, Christopher Columbus, and the Moors. Irving served as the American ambassador to Spain in the 1840s. Irving was born and raised in Manhattan to a merchant family. He made his literary debut in 1802 with a series of observational letters to the ''Morning Chronicle'', written under the pseudonym Letters of Jonathan Oldstyle, Gent., Jonathan Oldstyle. He temporarily moved to England for the family business in 1815, where he achieved fame with the publicat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Cullen Bryant
William Cullen Bryant (November 3, 1794 – June 12, 1878) was an American romantic poet, journalist, and long-time editor of the '' New York Evening Post''. Born in Massachusetts, he started his career as a lawyer but showed an interest in poetry early in his life. In 1825, Bryant relocated to New York City, where he became an editor of two major newspapers. He also emerged as one of the most significant poets in early literary America and has been grouped among the fireside poets for his accessible and popular poetry. Early life and education Bryant was born on November 3, 1794, in a log cabin near Cummington, Massachusetts; this home of his birth is commemorated with a plaque. He was the second son of Peter Bryant (August 12, 1767 – March 20, 1820), a physician and later a state legislator, and Sarah Snell (December 4, 1768 – May 6, 1847). The genealogy of his mother traces back to passengers on the '' Mayflower'', including John Alden (1599–1687), his wife Prisci ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Troy, New York
Troy is a city in and the county seat of Rensselaer County, New York, United States. It is located on the western edge of the county, on the eastern bank of the Hudson River just northeast of the capital city of Albany, New York, Albany. At the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population of Troy was 51,401. Troy has close ties to Albany and nearby Schenectady, New York, Schenectady, forming a region called the Capital District (New York), Capital District, which has a population of 1.24 million. The area long had been occupied by the Mohican Indian tribe, but Dutch settlement began in the mid-17th century. The Dutch colony was conquered by the English in 1664, renamed Troy in 1789 and was incorporated as a Town (New York), town in 1791. Due to the confluence of major waterways and a geography that supported water power, the American Industrial Revolution took hold in this area, making Troy reputedly the fourth-wealthiest city in America around the turn of the 20th cent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
