1800’s Cowboy Christmas
Americans caught the Christmas spirit more fervently than gold fever in the 1800’s. Across America children eagerly awaited visits from Santa Claus as his legend grew thanks to Washington Irving’s Sinterklass adventures described in History of New York (1809) and
Clement Moore’s wildly popular poem, “A Visit from St. Nicholas” (1823). Americans loved Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol (1842) and embraced many of its holiday traditions. But frontier festivities, food and family celebrations differed greatly from their eastern urban cousins’.
The Journey Westward
“Go West, Young man, Go west!” inspired many dreams when this quote was first coined in an 1851 newspaper. But a young man’s dreams would soon become a nightmare if the young pioneer rushed towards adventure without careful planning.