The story goes that the summer of 1945 was oppressively hot in Southern California.

And one day, in July, the musician Mel Tourmet went over to the home of his songwriting partner, Robert Wells.

But when Mel arrived, Robert was nowhere in sight.

So as Mel was waiting, he noticed that on the piano was a spiral notebook, with four lines scribbled down in pencil, lines that seemed

rather out of place for the sweltering July heat. Eventually, Robert walked into the room,

and when Mel asked him about the lyrics, he replied,

Mel, I've been trying everything to cool down. I've been in the pool, I took a cold shower,

I had a cold drink, but I couldn't escape this feeling of being hot. So I figured maybe if I

could write a few lines of wintertime verse, then I could beat the heat, psychologically.

Now that Mel understood the reasoning, he looked at the lines again and said,

you know, I think you might be on to something here.

The two got to work fleshing out the music and the rest of the lyrics.

When it was finished, they took it over to a music publisher who flatly rejected them.

So that same afternoon, they took the song over to a singer whose career was as hot as that

scorching July heat, a singer by the name of Nat King Cole, who instantly saw the potential

and basically called dibs on the song.

Almost a year later, in June of 1946, Nat King Cole and his trio recorded the song for Capitol Records,

and Christmas would never sound the same again.

Though the song's title is simply The Christmas Song, it's commonly referred to by its famous opening line,

chestnuts roasting on an open fire.

An image so quintessentially Christmassy, as festive as Yuletide choirs, turkey and mistletoe.

An image so Christmassy that it made a fitting opening line for a popular Christmas song.

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