December in New York City is a holiday wonderland, the streets blanketed with twinkling lights, decked out firs and time-held traditions. But what might surprise you is that several of these beloved celebrations trace back to New York City’s Dutch beginnings. As the Dutch expanded their global influence, they brought their customs with them to New Amsterdam. And as the English turned the colonial holding into New York City, these winter traditions morphed into some of the modern Christmas traditions we hold dear today — including, crucially, everyone’s favorite Santa Claus.
The joining of the city’s colonial winter traditions can be traced back to New York poet Clement Clarke Moore’s classic holiday poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” better known as “’Twas the Night Before Christmas.” Published in 1823, the poem describes a magical character — “a right jolly old elf” — arriving on a sleigh with “eight tiny rein-deer.” This figure, of course, is Santa Claus. And while Moore’s poem helped shape the Santa we recognize today, the version he describes actually stems from the Dutch celebrations of St. Nicholas, or Sinterklaas, and the English tradition of Father Christmas, a personification of the holiday.
St. Nicholas is derived from the real historical figure St. Nicholas of Myra, who lived in present-day Türkiye from 271 C.E. to December 6, 343 C.E. St. Nicholas was known for his generosity, performing miracles and deeds like gift-giving and distributing his wealth among the poor. In the Catholic faith, St. Nicholas is celebrated as the patron saint of sailors, merchants, children, students, pawnbrokers and (naturally) toymakers. As stories of St. Nicholas’ deeds traveled across Europe, the Dutch embraced the figure. The celebration of the saint’s feast day, also known as Sinterklaas, on December 5 or 6, has become a centuries-old Dutch tradition.
As the Dutch presence in North America grew in New Amsterdam, so did the celebration of Sinterklaas. In preparation for Sinterklaas’s arrival, children in New Amsterdam would place a single shoe by the fireplace, alongside a treat for his horse companion. The following morning on the saint’s feast day, December 6, children were traditionally greeted with Speculaas (a spiced cookie often molded into different shapes), oranges, a small toy and a poem.
People from all across Europe came to settle in New Amsterdam’s major port of what is today Lower Manhattan, and the gift-giving excitement of Sinterklaas spread to all children in the colony, Dutch or otherwise. Historian Russell Shorto described the formation of the Christmas culture: “Among the English, the French, the German, the Swedish families of Manhattan, pressure was brought to bear on parents, and the Dutch tradition was adopted and, later pushed forward a couple of weeks to align with the more generally observed festival of Christmas.” Even after the transition of colonial power from the Dutch to the English, Sinterklaas was still celebrated in the region, and traditions continued to blend. And after the American Revolution, writers like Moore solidified what would become Christmas canon — like stockings hung by the chimney, leaving treats for the reindeer, and an appearance by the original jolly gift-giving elf, Santa Claus.
Theresa DeCicco-Dizon is a public historian and museum educator based in New York City.
photo: iStock
