Ninety Years Later, the Message Is the Same

One of this nation’s most enduring Christmas tales is the reply by Francis P. Church, an editorial writer for the New York Sun, to a letter from Virginia O’Hanlon, 8, of Manhattan, asking if there was a Santa Claus. The famed response first appeared in the Sun on Sept. 21, 1897. When she grew up, Virginia became Mrs. Virginia O’Hanlon Douglas and was a schoolteacher in New York City. She later retired to the small community of North Chatham, N.Y., near Albany. Mrs. Douglas died May 13, 1971, at the age of 81, but her letter and Church’s reply live on.

“Is there a Santa Claus?

“We take pleasure in answering at once and thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of the Sun:

Dear Editor:

I am 8 years old.

Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.

Papa says ‘If you see it in the Sun, it’s so.’

Please tell me the truth, Is there a Santa Claus?

VIRGINIA O’HANLON

“115 West 95th St.

Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except what they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! How dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable their existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world and not the strongest man, not even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernatural beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.