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Happy Saturday, everybody.

As we're approaching Christmas, it seemed like the perfect time to revisit our episode on Washington Irving.

Although he's most well known for the tale of the Headless Horseman that's told in his story, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

Irving's writing about Christmas is important and deeply influential to the way the holiday

is celebrated in the United States, probably more than most people are aware.

This episode originally came out on December 20, 2021.

Enjoy.

Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production of IHeart Radio. Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy B. Wilson. And I'm Holly Fry. Over the years, we've talked about various influences on Christmas as a holiday, particularly in the U.S. and the UK. So we've talked about Charles Dickens a Christmas Carol, the poem, A Visit from St. Nicholas, Rudolph the Red Nose, Reindeer, Joel Roberts Poinset, namesake of the Poinsettia,

Norad's tradition of tracking Santa's progress on Christmas Eve, and then most recently our

episode on how the Nutcracker Ballet became a Christmas time staple.

Another Christmas influence might come to mind more in connection with Halloween because it's Washington Irving, author of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, which became part of Disney's The Adventures of Icobot and Mr. Toad in 1949 and absolutely truly terrified me when I was a child.

We will talk about Irving's work and his Christmas influence today,

including his influence of Charles Dickens.

Washington Irving did most of his Christmas-related writing

pretty early in his career,

but we're going to save the most detailed discussion of it

for the last third of the episode

after our second sponsor break.

Also, if you listen to this show with anybody who's going to be just truly, eagerly awaiting

Santa Claus on Christmas Eve, that part of the episode might be something to just say for later.

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