Santa Trivia

C Eight. Eight, called out in pairs as St. Nick sends them up to the rooftop.

C Blizzard. The eight are Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donder and Blitzen.

C His nose. "And laying his finger aside of his nose, and giving a nod, up the chimney he rose."

C St. Nicholas. Nicholas was a 4th-century bishop known for secret gift-giving.

A Dutch. Historians argue over how much the Dutch settlers of New Amsterdam actually celebrated him, but the name itself is clearly Dutch.

C Coca-Cola. The ads helped lock in the image, but Coca-Cola didn't invent the red suit. Santa was wearing red in illustrations long before 1931.

B Canada. NORAD stands for North American Aerospace Defense Command. Volunteers answer Santa calls in Colorado on Christmas Eve.

B Kris Kringle. It comes from Christkindl, the German name for the Christ Child, who brought gifts in parts of Germany. Americans turned it into another name for Santa.

A Dasher. Santa calls them out in pairs, starting with Dasher and Dancer and ending with Donder and Blitzen.

B A cherry. His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry. The same stanza says his beard was as white as the snow.

D Clement Clarke Moore. It was published anonymously in 1823. Moore claimed it years later, though descendants of Henry Livingston Jr. have long argued he wrote it.

A The stump of a pipe. The poem adds that the smoke encircled his head like a wreath.

B Elf. The poem's Santa is small enough to drive a 'miniature sleigh' with 'tiny reindeer.' The big, life-size Santa came later.

A December 6. In many countries children set out shoes or stockings the night before, on December 5.

C Pay dowries for his three daughters. In some versions the gold lands in stockings hung by the fire to dry, which is one story behind the Christmas stocking.

B A kerchief and a cap. Mamma wears the kerchief and the narrator wears the cap. A kerchief is a cloth tied over the head.

D Thomas Nast. Nast's Santa was a big, round, cheerful man, and his drawings did a lot to set the American look.

D The North Pole. An 1866 Nast drawing in Harper's Weekly, Santa Claus and His Works, labeled his home Santa Claussville, N.P.

A Sears. The number in the ad, in a Colorado Springs newspaper, reached a military air defense center instead of the store's Santa.

A H0H 0H0. Read it out loud. Canada Post volunteers answer letters sent there every year.

A Indiana. Santa Claus, Indiana, got its name in the 1850s, and volunteers there have been answering children's letters for decades.

A Robert L. May. May wrote the story in rhyming verse. The company later gave him the rights, which made him a comfortable living.

C Montgomery Ward. The Chicago-based retailer gave away 2.4 million copies in 1939, the first year.

A Belsnickel. The real Belsnickel was a ragged figure who visited before Christmas, rewarding good children and scaring the rest.

B A mince pie and a glass of sherry. A carrot for the reindeer usually goes with it, same as in the US.

A Jultomten. A tomte was a little household spirit who watched over the farm. Leaving him a bowl of porridge kept him happy.

C Turkey. Today the town is called Demre, and its old Church of St. Nicholas draws pilgrims and tourists.

B Père Fouettard. His name means Father Whipper, and he carries switches while Nicholas hands out treats.

C Dunder and Blixem. Those are Dutch for thunder and lightning. Later versions changed them to Donder and Blitzen, and the 1949 Rudolph song made it Donner.

C New York. It ran in the Troy Sentinel, in Troy, New York, on December 23, 1823.

A Bari, Italy. The Basilica of St. Nicholas in Bari was built to hold them. Venice later took some fragments too.

B St. Nicholas. They're said to stand for the three bags of gold from his dowry legend. Nicholas is a patron saint of pawnbrokers.

D Washington Irving. Irving's book was published under the pen name Diedrich Knickerbocker, and it shows St. Nicholas riding over the treetops in a wagon.

D A sleigh pulled by a reindeer. It showed a single reindeer. Two years later, A Visit from St. Nicholas gave him eight.

A Union soldiers. Santa hands out gifts at a Union Army camp during the Civil War, wearing a jacket covered in stars and stripes.

C Haddon Sundblom. Sundblom painted Santa for Coke for over 30 years. He used a friend as his model at first, and later himself.

C L. Frank Baum. Baum wrote it two years after The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. In his version, Santa is a baby found in the forest and raised by a wood nymph.

A Col. Harry Shoup. Shoup played along and had his staff give the caller Santa's position. He became known as the Santa Colonel.

A 1912. Postmaster General Frank Hitchcock approved it. The program is now called USPS Operation Santa.

A Rollo and Reginald. Rollo seemed too cheerful and Reginald too British, by most accounts. Rudolph got the job.

D San Francisco. A prankster group called the Cacophony Society staged the first one as street theater poking fun at holiday shopping.