Yes, there is a Santa Claus

It became one of history’s most famous Christmas quotes:

“Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus.”

In 1897, Dr. Philip O’Hanlon, asked by his then eight-year-old daughter, Virginia, whether Santa Claus really existed.

Then O’Hanlon suggested she write to the New York Sun, a major New York newspaper at that time to ensure that “If you can see in The Sun, it’s so.”

On 21 September 1897, the New York Sun ran an editorial, titled “Is There a Santa Claus?” It was inspired by the letter to the editor written by Laura Virginia O’Hanlon, who wanted to know if the jolly, chubby man in the red suit really existed.

It was The Sun editor Francis Pharcellus Church, in whose younger days as a correspondent in the American Civil War sapped him of hope and faith in society at large. Despite the dispiritedness, he would manage to run a fitting reply in the paper that would become one of the world’s most famous Christmas quotes.

And Church’s message to Little Miss O’Hanlon was the declarative that would fill the hearts of people the world over.

It became one of history’s most famous Christmas quotes:

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus.

Veteran journalist Francis Pharcellus Church has become the history’s most reprinted newspaper editorial appearing in part or whole in dozens of languages, books, movies, publishing and on posters and stamps.

Here is full text of the famous editorial:

“Is there a Santa Claus?”

“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 NINETY-FIFTH STREET.”

“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 this 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 may tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart.

Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal 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.”

Isn’t it fantastic Christmas story?