| 
BY
ADRIENNE FRANK
Photo by Jeff
Watts
|
Four
years ago, while combing through the periodicals at the Library
of Congress, W. Joseph Campbell stumbled upon something extraordinary—a
piece of journalism history that’s as much a part of the holiday
season as candy canes and caroling. The
American University journalism professor had discovered a tearsheet
from the Sept. 21, 1897, edition of the New York Sun, which
featured the iconic editorial “Is There a Santa Claus?”
The editorial, which captured the wonder and excitement of the holidays
with the famous line, “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus,”
was a Christmas present of sorts for Campbell, a scholar who’s
long been fascinated by late nineteenth-century journalism. In
fact, Campbell was at the library that fateful day conducting research
for a project about the state of journalism in 1897, which he explains
“was an exceptional year, a pivotal moment in the trajectory
of the profession.” It was the year, he says, that the New
York Times’s logo, “All the news that’s fit to
print,” moved to the front page; also, 1897 saw the first use
of yellow journalism and the first modern use of public relations.
In
addition, Campbell says a “clash of paradigms” emerged
in 1897. William Randolph Hearst of the New York Journal
put forth the idea of activist journalism—the notion that newspapers
should take action to right wrongs. On the other hand, Adolph Ochs,
publisher of the New York Times, argued that newspapers should
take an authoritative, detached approach. Ochs, explains Campbell,
ultimately prevailed. And
of course, 1897 was also the year that saw the publication of what
has become the most popular, most reprinted editorial in American
journalism. Campbell
says he didn’t even know the editorial—which is still
reprinted in newspapers across the country at Christmastime —was
written in 1897. However, because the editorial fit within the time
line of his study, Campbell began scouring through mountains of
microfilm, scanning every December issue of the Sun from
1897 until 1949 for the editorial and letters to the editor related
to the piece. “It
was one of those painstaking projects that you can only do in Washington,
and that takes a lot of time,” says Campbell, who likens the
process to piecing together evidence for an investigative journalism
story. “I was blessed that the Library of Congress was only
a Metro ride away.” Contrary
to popular belief, Campbell’s research indicates that the editorial,
written in response to eight-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon’s
query about Saint Nick, wasn’t an immediate success when it
first hit newsstands in 1897. He
says the Sun, which was founded in 1833 and became one of
the first successful penny daily newspapers in the country, was
hesitant to reprint editorials. Furthermore, the paper didn’t
want to promote its journalists, including Francis Church, the writer
who penned the editorial, as celebrities or star reporters. However,
in the 1920s the Sun began running the magical Christmas
essay as a standard feature on its editorial page at Christmastime.
(The Sun folded in January 1950, though it was reborn in
2002.) Before then the Sun ran the essay sporadically. Readers
were instrumental in keeping the piece alive, says Campbell. “It
touched a chord with people. There’s something timeless about
this editorial. I don’t think the New York Sun realized
it at the time, but readers did.
“Editors don’t always have the greatest insights as to
what readers find appealing and interesting, and even newsworthy,”
he continues. “I’m sure there are lessons along those
lines with this editorial—listen to your readers, listen to
your audience.” In
researching the editorial, Campbell also set off for Albany, N.Y.,
to meet O’Hanlon’s eldest grandson. The grandson’s
collection of clippings and his memories of O’Hanlon were helpful
in piecing together the puzzles associated with the editorial, chief
among them, the odd timing of the letter. It was published three
months prior to Christmas. According
to Campbell, people have speculated that Virginia wrote to the newspaper
at the start of the school year to set the record straight after
friends told her there was no Santa Claus. “But it was more
likely that she wrote the letter soon after her birthday in July
1897 because, as a child, she always began wondering after her birthday
what she would receive for Christmas,” says Campbell. Perhaps,
he explains, it was her curiosity about her Christmas presents,
even though it was summertime, that set in motion the letter to
the Sun. Campbell
also proposes that the newspaper may have misplaced or ignored the
letter for a few weeks. “Virginia said in interviews that she
waited for weeks for the reply to be published,” he says. O’Hanlon
even forgot she wrote the letter, which begged, “Please tell
me the truth. Is there a Santa Claus?” The
response—which was finally printed on page six of the paper,
with no byline, on Sept. 21, 1897—read, in part: “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.”
Photo by Jeff
Watts
|
For
his research about “Is There A Santa Claus?” which is
part of a book he’s penning about the exceptional year of 1897,
Campbell won the American Journalism Historian Association’s
Outstanding Faculty Paper Award this fall. It’s the second
time Campbell has received the accolade; in 1999 he was honored
for his research on the readership of the yellow press. That paper
later became a chapter in his 2001 book, Yellow Journalism.
Despite
his research and award, though, Campbell still can’t quite
put his finger on the magic underpinning “Is There A Santa
Claus.” “It’s
lyrical, it’s nicely written, it’s reassuring, and it
doesn’t talk down to the reader,” he says. “It’s
everyone’s best answer to the inevitable childhood question,”
he says, adding that O’Hanlon’s grandson believes the
editorial reminds people of their childhood and the glow of Christmases
past. “There
is something there that’s touched a chord through the generations;
it’s a rare piece of journalism, as not many stories or editorials
can do that,” continues Campbell. “Most of it is gone
a week or a day later, but this one is an exception.” |
