By William H. Benson
The Parallel Lives
Of The NOBLE AMERICAN RELIGIOUS THINKERS AND BELIEVERS:
Roger Williams VS. Cotton Mathers
NEW ARTICLES
White Christmas
White Christmas
The crooner Bing Crosby first sang “White Christmas” live on the “Kraft Music Hall” radio show on December 26, 1941, nineteen days after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.
It was a frightening time, one of our country’s darkest moments. The nation felt wounded, violated, and every living American knew that a tough fight would follow. Holiday spirit was at a low.
Yet, Bing’s song set aside the worry for a moment, and because of its “nostalgia around the holidays, regardless of religion,” it resonated with audiences.
“It’s not upbeat. Its lyrics are wistful, even a sad recollection of past holidays.” Yet people loved its melancholy mood, and it has remained a holiday classic.
Irving Berlin, a prolific songwriter, wrote “White Christmas,” for the 1942 movie, “Holiday Inn,” starring Fred Astaire and Bing Crosby, who sang the song in the movie, along with Marjorie Reynolds.
A story later emerged that Berlin raced into his Manhattan office and asked his secretary to take dictation, for, what he said, was “the best song I ever wrote. The best song anybody ever wrote.”
Irving Berlin was born Israel Bellin, a Russian Jewish immigrant, on May 11, 1888, in Tolochin, Russia, now in Belarus, and he died on September 22, 1989, at the age of 101 years and 4 months.
During that century plus of living, he wrote hundreds of songs, including: “God Bless America,” “Easter Parade,” “Puttin’ on the Ritz,” “There’s No Business Like Show Business,” and the wedding song “Always.”
“White Christmas” though was his most popular, and it sold the best, by far.
Irving Berlin and his second wife, Ellin Mackay—an heiress of Irish Catholic descent—had four children. One son, Irving Berlin, Jr., though died at the age of three weeks, on Christmas Day, 1928.
Although Irving did not celebrate Christmas, he and his wife visited their son’s grave every year on Christmas Day. Some have speculated that the song was Berlin’s method of coping with his tragic loss.
In 2002, the author Jody Rosen wrote a book, “White Christmas: The Story of a Song.” In it, Rosen said, “The kind of deep secret of the song may be that it was Berlin responding in some way to his melancholy about the death of his son.”
Of the song, Berlin’s daughter, Linda Emmett, said, “It’s very evocative. The snow, the Christmas card, the sleigh, the sleigh bells, and it’s entirely secular.”
The poet and biographer Carl Sandburg wrote, “We have learned to be a little sad, and a little lonesome without being sickly about it. This feeling is caught in the song of one thousand jukeboxes that is whistled across streets and in homes. ‘I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas.’
“When we sing it, we do not hate anybody, and there are things we love. Way down under the latest hit of his, Irving Berlin catches us where we love peace.”
Richard Corliss, a film critic and editor at “Time” magazine, said, “[The song] connected with GI’s in their first winter away from home. It voiced the ache of separation, and the wistfulness they felt for the girl back home, for the innocence of youth.”
Bing Crosby said that whenever and wherever he performed for GIs during World War II, they shouted at him on the stage that they wanted to hear him sing “White Christmas.”
Jody Rosen speculates that Berlin may have written the song in 1937, when he was in California, away from wife and kids and home, when making a movie in Beverly Hills, California.
This makes sense when one considers the lyrics to the song’s sole verse that no one knows or hears.
“The sun is shining, the grass is green, the orange and palm trees sway. There’s never been such a day in Beverly Hills, L.A. But it’s December the 24th, and I am longing to be up north. I’m dreaming of a white Christmas.”
All we hear Bing Crosby sing, or anyone else sing, is the chorus, composed of just three sentences.
“I’m dreaming of a white Christmas, just like the ones I used to know, where tree tops glisten, and children listen, to hear sleigh bells in the snow.
“I’m dreaming of a white Christmas, with every Christmas card I write. May your days be merry and bright, and may all your Christmas’ be white.”
The song became an even bigger hit for Bing Crosby when he sang it in the 1954 movie, “White Christmas,” which starred Bing, along with Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney, and Vera-Ellen.
According to the Guinness World Records, the song “White Christmas” is the all-time best-selling Christmas song, and also the all-time best-selling song ever, with some 50 million copies sold.
The closest to that record is Elton John’s “Candle in the Wind.”
A white Christmas is not that unusual for those of us who live in Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, South and North Dakota, on the Great Plains, but it is for those who live in California, south Texas, Arizona, and Florida.
We can dream about a white Christmas, and we may get it. Have a Merry Christmas!
Bill Benson, of Sterling, is a dedicated historian.
HARRY TRUMAN
HARRY TRUMANHARRY TRUMAN by William H. Benson December 18, 2003 On the morning of December 5, 1950 President Harry Truman was reading in the Washington Post a most unflattering commentary on Margaret’s singing performance the evening before in Washington. With...
CHILDREN’S LITERATURE
CHILDREN’S LITERATURECHILDREN’S LITERATURE by William H. Benson December 4, 2003 Horror has never held my attention. I have tried to complete a Stephen King novel numerous times, and invariably after a couple of chapters of gruesome and fanciful scenes, I give...
WILLPOWER AND GRATITUDE
WILLPOWER AND GRATITUDEWILLPOWER AND GRATITUDE by William H. Benson November 20, 2003 M. Scott Peck said in his book The Road Less Traveled that life’s two greatest possessions are a forceful will and a grateful attitude. A person who has a forceful will is considered...
THE WAR IN THE PACIFIC
THE WAR IN THE PACIFICTHE WAR IN THE PACIFIC By William H. Benson November 6, 2003 Although I am not a big fan of Stephen Ambrose, I did read his last book, To America—Personal Reflections of an Historian, which he published just prior to his passing a...
SMALLPOX
SMALLPOXSMALLPOX By William H. Benson October 23, 2003 The minister at the North Church in Boston, Cotton Mather, received his first printed copy of Magnalia Christi Americana on October 29, 1702, and on the same day he discovered that his 8-year-od daughter had...
TUESDAY–SEPTEMBER 11, 2001
TUESDAY--SEPTEMBER 11, 2001TUESDAY--SEPTEMBER 11, 2001 by William H. Benson September 11, 2003 Last week Newsweek reported that Osama bin Laden, hiding in Afghanistan's Kunar province, spoke last January at the funeral of one of his daughters-in-law, who had died...
Older Posts
THE WILL POWER TO WIN
THE WILL POWER TO WINTHE WILL POWER TO WIN by William H. Benson August 28, 2003 The Sixties were years marked by two massive struggles: first, the Black Americans demanded equality and an end to discrimination and second, whether to fight or give up in Vietnam. ...
CALIFORNIA AND ILLEGAL ALIENS
CALIFORNIA AND ILLEGAL ALIENSCALIFORNIA AND ILLEGAL ALIENS by William H. Benson August 14,. 2003 By August 13, 1521 Cortez had effectively conquered the Aztec Indians in present-day Mexico City. He and his fellow conquistadors established a two-tiered class...
HERMAN MELVILLE’S MOBY DICK
HERMAN MELVILLE'S MOBY DICKHERMAN MELVILLE'S MOBY DICK by William H. Benson July 31, 2003 Unlike Jonah's great fish, the White Whale had a name--Moby Dick, and unlike Jonah's short story, Herman Melville wrote a lengthy novel. But like Jonah and the...
THEORIES
THEORIESTHEORIES by William H. Benson July 17, 2003 So much of how we, the members of the Western tradition, see and experience our world is derived from, or at least shaped by, the theories presented by a series of original thinkers. For example, Karl Marx,...
THOMAS PAINE
THOMAS PAINETHOMAS PAINE by William H. Benson July 3, 2003 Thomas Paine has never received a place equal among the other Revolutionary leaders, such as Benjamin Franklin, Samuel Adams, George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, even though Paine's...
STONEHENGE
STONEHENGESTONEHENGE by William H. Benson June 19, 2003 The ancient British built Stonehenge almost 4000 years ago, beginning around 1850 B.C. and completing it in 4 phases over some 300 years. Originally, 30 blocks of gray sandstone, each about 13 1/2 feet,...
One of University of Northern Colorado’s 2020 Honored Alumni
William H. Benson
Local has provided scholarships for history students for 15 years
A Sterling resident is among five alumni selected to be recognized this year by the University of Northern Colorado. Bill Benson is one of college’s 2020 Honored Alumni.
Each year UNC honors alumni in recognition for their outstanding contributions to the college, their profession and their community. This year’s honorees were to be recognized at an awards ceremony on March 27, but due to the COVID-19 outbreak that event has been cancelled. Instead UNC will recognize the honorees in the fall during homecoming Oct. 10 and 11……
Newspaper Columns
The Duodecimal System
For centuries, the ancient Romans calculated sums with their clunky numerals: I, V, X, L, C, D, and M; or one, five, ten, 50, 100, 500, and 1,000. They knew nothing better.
The Thirteenth Amendment
On Jan. 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, and by it, he declared that “all persons held as slaves” within the rebellious states “are and henceforward shall be free.” Lincoln’s Proclamation freed some 3.1 million slaves within the Confederacy.
The Fourteenth Amendment
After Congress and enough states ratified the thirteenth amendment that terminated slavery, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866. This law declared that “all people born in the United States are entitled to be citizens, without regard to race, color, or previous condition of slavery or involuntary servitude.” The Act equated birth to citizenship.
The New-York Packet and the Constitution
Jill Lepore, the Harvard historian, published her newest book a month ago, These Truths: A History of the United States. In a short introduction, she describes in detail the Oct. 30, 1787 edition of a semi-weekly newspaper, The New-York Packet.
Mr. Benson’s writings on the U.S. Constitution are a great addition to the South Platte Sentinel. Its inspiring to see the history of the highest laws of this country passed on to others.
– Richard Hogan
Mr. Benson, I cannot thank you enough for this scholarship. As a first-generation college student, the prospect of finding a way to afford college is a very daunting one. Thanks to your generous donation, my dream of attending UNC and continuing my success here is far more achievable
– Cedric Sage Nixon
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– Extra Times
FUTURE BOOKS
- Thomas Paine vs. George Whitefield
- Ralph Waldo Emerson vs. Joseph Smith
- William James vs. Mary Baker Eddy
- Mark Twain vs. Billy Graham
- Henry Louis Mencken vs. Jim Bakker
