Stuff You Should Know - The 2024 SYSK Christmas Extravaganza!

Episode Date: December 23, 2024

Welcome to the end of 2024 and our annual Christmas Extravaganza episode, brought to you ad-free for you listening pleasure. Please pour a hot toddy and enjoy around the fir tree of your choosing.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's trying to come, but she's had car trouble, I guess. Either way, she's here in spirit, the Christmas spirit, and this is stuff you should know. That's right. The holiday spectacular and a couple of traditions here is that this episode is brought to you ad free and also- By no one.

Exactly, by us and then also we have managed to work it out I don't know about every year but it seems like every year where this is the last episode that we record of our recording year and it's so great and so fun to wind it down this way. It's such a special tradition and Chuck I'm really excited about this particular one because this is a good combination, a good assemblage of stuff, I guess you could say. But add some holly to that.

Yeah, and I also realized when you sent your stuff over, I was like, hey, we kind of have a theme for one of yours and one of mine, which is sugary confections from different parts of the world. Right. So those and one of mine. Yeah. Which is, you know, like sugary confections from different parts of the world. Right. So those are kind of fun. Maybe we should do those back to back.

Okay, yeah, I think that's a good idea. And then also we have another theme, movies. Oh yeah. Or Christmas specials, I don't know, however you want to put it. That's right. Where should we start this year? Do you want to start with the cocktails so you can get crocked while we do this year? Do you wanna start with the cocktail

so you can get crocked while we do this? Sure. Okay. I think you should announce what's going on to everybody. Yeah, so what's happening is we usually try and source some sort of a holiday cocktail and tell you how to make it. Sometimes we make it and have it on our own.

And this year we had someone send in a holiday cocktail. Few months ago we got an email from somebody named Holly Eitenmiller. I think you nailed it. And this is a drink that Holly invented called, hang on to your hats here, Grandma's Christmas Breath. That's so great. One thing I've noticed when you look around

and read Christmas stuff and try to find Christmas stuff, grandma is almost invariably portrayed as a drunk. Oh, I didn't really, I wasn't sure what the breath would be, but I guess boozy breath, that makes sense. Boozy breath, yeah. Like I found a recipe for something or other, it was like grandma's version, it has like whiskey and rum in it.

Yeah. Everybody's grandma gets drunk apparently on Christmas. Well, our dear departed grandma Mary, Emily's grandmother, who was the senior general in the stuff you shoot in the army, he passed away at the ripe old age of 101. That's awesome. When she was in her 90s, like around Christmas, she would have a little Bailey's in her coffee.

Oh yeah, nice. Just to touch every now and then. A little Christmas iree. Yeah, so I guess Christmas time, I don't know, equals drunk grandparents. Yeah, that's how I'm taking it. I mean, Holly Eitenmiller's, the name of her recipe just says it all, I think.

Yeah, so I asked Holly if there was a story behind it, but I did not hear back by recording time, so. She doesn't want to talk about it? Yeah, you know what I'll do, through the magic of editing, I'll pause and go get some ice. Oh, okay. And then I'll be right back, but to your ears, I'll be back in like one second.

Okay. Hold on. Do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do. Okay, I'm back everybody. I have my shaker with ice. Josh, why don't you read out the ingredients and I'll pour them up. Okay, you ready? Yeah.

Prepare, Chuck, one shot of Captain Morgan gingerbread rum. Yeah, okay, so the story here is this stuff is really hard to find and I had to get like a delivery service because I literally couldn't find it anywhere. Do you remember I tried to get liquor delivered to you as a condolence like a year ago and it just did not work out. I tried like five different services and none of it worked. I don't remember that, but you know what? I only gave up.

That's the thought that counts. I kept texting you like, are you going to be home at 6 p.m.? Are you going to be home at 3 a.m. tomorrow? Are you going to be home at noon today? Oh no. Yeah. All right. So the gingerbread rum just went in. I took a little sniff and it smells cloyingly sweet. Oh, it sounds delicious, but I could see that.

All right. what's next? I also, I just wanna make a little note here. A shot is very ambiguous. You could make a quart-sized shot. You could make a little tiny shot. Like a shot is another way of putting one part. Yeah, I mean, I just use a standard bar jigger. So whatever the big side is.

The big side's usually two ounces. Okay, all right. All right, this is gonna be quite a Christmas episode. The second ingredient, Chuck, is one shot of Grand Marnier. Yeah, I think you just heard the cork pop, the infamous. Oh, I hear it. Boy, you hear that? Yeah, that's definitely two ounces. I'm not saying I'm going to drink all of this.

All right, what's next? As much orange juice as you wish. I would strongly recommend fresh squeezed. Any time you're using citrus in a cocktail, just do yourself a favor and squeeze it yourself. It's not that hard. All right, well, can we pause so I can go to the grocery store? Yes.

Now, I'm going to open up the old Tropicana that I just bought. Yeah. And I bought it at a convenience store, or I would have gotten an orange. I'm just going to do one shot of that. Okay. And just go one, one, one. Okay. I think that's a great idea.

And then do you have any ice on hand, or do we need to wait around for that, too? That's what I got in the shaker. Okay. Do you have any ice on hand or do we need to wait around for that too? That's what I got in the shaker. Okay. Chuck's doing the next thing everybody, shaking Grandma's Christmas spread together. Should I have this up or on the rocks? Probably on the rocks. I don't know.

It sounds like you got enough ice in there and this is boozy enough to go up. Alright, I'll go up then. We'll see. And then we're going to all wait around here to see what Chuck thinks of this. And also I want to say I'm not drinking booze right now, but I'm putting away most of a cord of eggnog as we speak. Yeah, it's, I mean, the only reason I'm doing this

is because I just felt like somebody should try this out on the air. And so here we go, everybody post production drum roll. Ta-da! Uh, okay. Oh, poor Holly. Her Christmas dreams have just been dashed. No, it's not bad. I mean, it is, it's orangey because the Grand Marnier and the orange juice, obviously. Right. And it's not bad, you know?

I mean, it's definitely like a festive holiday drink. I would not recommend more than one of them. Oh, is it pretty boozy? I mean, it's pretty just sort of sweet. I gotcha. It depends on your tolerance for sweet drinks. Is that rum really coming through, or is it getting missed in the orange? It could probably come through a little bit more so I could probably add a

little less orange juice if there were to be a next time. Or you could add more rum. Well let's not get carried away here. Okay well I say we move on speaking of carried away let's carry ourselves away to the next segment. Yeah. And as per Christmas tradition, holiday show tradition, Jerry's going to add some really nice Christmas-y interstitial music. So take it away, Jerry. Alright Chuck, how are you feeling? Good, and big thanks to Holly again for this drink. Yeah, so we're going to teach everybody how to play Dirty Santa next.

We're doing that with an assist from Nella Bailey McGough. I'm pretty sure that's how you'd say her last name, from Southern Living, who wrote a pretty top-notch article on how to play this, why to play it, and they even turned up the origin of the name, because it's got a bunch of different names. White Elephant, apparently in the South, were the ones who typically call it Dirty Santa. Never heard of that. You've never heard of Dirty Santa?

That's all I've ever heard of. Well, aside from White Elephant. I've only heard White Elephant. Interesting. What about Yankee Swap? That one's new to me. No, never heard of that one. I've only heard White Elephant when it comes to this kind of game.

Okay, well I've heard Dirty Santa and White Elephant, but regardless, the White Elephant name seems to be the traditional name for this, which is, it's kind of like, it's a party game you would play at your holiday party, and in the spirit basically of Secret Santa, where everybody gives somebody else a gift anonymously, and then the person tries to guess who gave it to them. It's very nice and sweet. This is not,, it's not supposed to be mean or anything like that But there's a lot there's some twists to it that make it dirty That's right because it involves the trading of gifts, which we'll get to the rules in a second

It can well, I'll mention that when we get to the trading part But okay. Yeah, the origins is interesting because I never knew this as far as the white elephant name. Supposedly it came from what is now Thailand, what was Siam back in the day. And the king of Siam was, if he was annoyed, he might give someone an albino elephant if he didn't like them very much, right? Yes, but the key here was to the cordier who received this gift,

I mean, this is a lavish gift. Yeah. But it was a lavish gift that cost a lot and took a lot of effort to keep healthy and happy. Right. So although it seemed like you would really gain the king's favor, the king was giving you a real problem

to deal with for the rest of the elephant's life. So it's a pretty sharp little idea that Yul Brynner came up with. And that's where the name came from, White Elephant, right? Yeah. Okay, so getting on to the modern incarnation of it, I did not see who invented this. I guess the King of Siam did.

But the modern incarnation, I don't know where that came from. But there are basically wherever you look up rules for the White Elephant game, there's some that are just tried and true, you're gonna find them in any set of rules. One of the big ones is set a dollar limit. You don't want some person just showing off

their Christmas bonus by, you know, they show up with a bunch of banging olyphs and speakers or something bonus by, you know, they show up with a bunch of banging Olufs and speakers or something like that, you know? By setting a limit at like 20 bucks, you're making the people get kind of creative. Yeah, and the whole idea here is to have fun. So yeah, 20 bucks I feel like is, I mean, you can set it according to whatever,

you know, financial pool you're swimming in, but I feel like $20 is a pretty good round number. Great, but yes, you know, financial pool you're swimming in, but I feel like $20 is a pretty good round number. Great. But yes, the cheaper, the lower the price limit, the more creative the people have to be to come up with something. Yeah, exactly. They give some tips here in this article, which is kind of fun, which is to try and

fool the unwrapper by wrapping it, wrapping perhaps a small thing in some big elaborate package, or by, if you get really creative, if you can even reshape something as far as the wrapping goes to where it looks like something else, like maybe a bottle of wine, when it in fact is just like a folded up whoopee cushion. Yes. Ooh, that's a good one. That's a great, great white elephant gift.

Those are probably only like $5. Right, so you, well not in 2024, pal. So you want to, in your invitation, specify, yes, wrap it, get creative with it, you're wrapping, but do not put it to or from things. This is all anonymous. And then everybody comes on the day of the party and they bring their gift wrapped

and they put it in a pile, the pool, as some people call it. And Nella Bailey McGoff specifies, do not put this area near your own family's real presence because you don't want to mix up like that. And then once everybody's assembled and you're usually sitting around in a circle or something so everybody can see everybody else, you draw numbers from a hat.

And the numbers in the hat number from one to the number of people playing, and everybody draws a number. That's right. So once you've drawn your number and are thus ordered in opening order, person number one is going to grab a gift, they're going to open it, they're going to show everybody what it is. Oh my God, it's four whoopee cushions because they're gonna open it, they're gonna show everybody what it is. Oh my God, it's four Whoopi cushions

because they're, well, probably three these days to hit that $20 mark. And that's it, they got their gift. Everyone gets a good laugh. Next up is person number two, and this is when it gets interesting because person number two has a choice. They can pick a new gift from the pile

or they can go ahead and just steal that first gift if that is something that they actually want. Yeah, there's also an alternate set of rules that say everyone picks a gift first, and then the stealing starts. But most of the time you can steal on that second turn. There's, this is where it gets a little hazy. So let's say that you're five people into this, right?

So person number five, it's their turn. If they go and steal person number four's gift, now it's time for person number four to go steal somebody else's gift, say person number two. Now person number two has to steal a gift. And this can just keep going on ad infinitum. So usually it's the third time a gift. And this can just keep going on ad infinitum. So usually it's the third the third time a gift is stolen the last person has to just go take a new gift

from the pile they don't get the steal or else and just keep going on and on and on. Right. And then there's some other restrictions on how many times a gift can be stolen or a person can be stolen from too right? Yeah I mean you can do house rules of course or regional rules but generally a gift can not be can be stolen or a person can be stolen from too, right? Yeah, I mean you can do house rules of course or regional rules, but generally a gift can not be, can be stolen no more than three times. If a gift is pronounced dead, that means you can't steal it anymore and that's after it's been stolen, right? Three times. Oh, oh, right, after the three times it can no longer be stolen. Yeah, and usually a person can only be stolen from three times as well,

and then whatever gift they're holding on the last time, that gets, whatever gift they go steal from somebody else or pick, that's their gift to keep. So you can play strategically here if there's actually a gift there that you want, like you really want that Whoopi cushion. You can choose it as your last gift after you're dead, essentially.

Yeah, if your gift is stolen, you can't steal it right back. You have to steal another gift or choose from the pile. And are there any other variations? Yeah, essentially, once all of this continues on, once this goes around and everybody say you have 15 people playing, after person 15's turn, you're back to person one because they had no choice. They had to choose a gift from the pile.

Now it's their turn to decide to steal. And if they decide to keep their gift, then the game's over. If they steal, it keeps going on until you finally reach somebody who goes, I'm good. I really love my Whoopi cushion. I'm keeping my gift. The party's essentially over at that point because the excitement has been so charged that there's nothing you could possibly do

to top it after that. I don't know if you got those Whoopi cushions. I say the party's just getting started. That's true. That's true. That's true. I mean, I was thinking you could drink like gallons of grandma's Christmas breath, and it still wouldn't bring about the thrill that the White Elephant game can bring. Yeah.

Well, two quick things. One thing I wanted to mention earlier on is I have seen this game go badly. Like, if somebody really wants to keep something and it gets stolen, they get their feelings hurt. Boy, try and park that attitude at the door. This is supposed to be fun, and if all of a sudden you're really getting mad because you didn't get that whoopee cushion, then do some self-reflection

on what you're bringing to the table. Yeah, for sure. I mean, you can go buy a whoopie cushion if you really need it. That's right. And the second thing I wanted to say, since you said gallons of this drink, as I was drinking it,

I think this would be really good as a punch. Like throw it in the punch bowl with some like cinnamon sticks and sliced oranges and some other. Like a bunch of ice? Bunch of ice and stuff like that. And I think it would make, like, a pretty decent party punch, actually. Would you add soda water to it?

I don't know. How does that hold up in a punch bowl? Well, very well. I mean, there's, like, a whole Sprite High Sea punch camp that is, like, crazy for that stuff. Yeah. It's carbonated. All right. Then I say pour four liters of Topo Chico in there. Okay. All right. That sounds good. All right, then I say pour four liters of topo chico in there. Okay. All right. That sounds good All right, actually that sounds terrible. That'd be mineral water mixed with it. You just want plain club soda

Yeah, and what's like a red? tinting like a Hi-C. Oh, I guess so but what's something that's not super sweet like Campari would that change the taste a lot? Yes Would that change the taste a lot? Yes. It definitely would. I have no idea what that would taste like after that point. It would be a little more festive as a punch, I think, if it was red or green. Yes.

For sure. I get what you're saying. I guess it's kind of brown right now. I mean, it's more orange. Oh, it is actually orange? Okay, good. Yeah, it looks like orange juice. Okay, well, that's it for White Elephant.

There is one quote I wanted to read from Nella Bailey McGough. All right. Oh boy. You know the, do you know the one? I'm pretty sure, go ahead. They say that the mixture of gag gifts and gifts people actually want

combine to make the nitro that fuels this amazing game. And I guess that Nella Bailey-McGough would be a really fun person to play White Elephant. Totally. I love it. Hey, let's hit that interstitial Christmas music again as we mosey on over to the next segment. -♪ MUSIC PLAYING. -♪ All right, I'd say we move on to, let's go ahead and knock out our two, or two confections. Oh, okay.

Which one do you want to do first? You know what, let's start with Italy because this is also another thing that a listener sent in, which is really great. People are starting to help program the show because it gets really, really hard to find new short Christmas stuff after all these years. But Carl, with a K, Hardin, sent in a suggestion to do a short stuff on pizzella. Pizzella?

Or pizzella? Pizzella, I thought. Pizzella? Yeah, you gotta say it like that. Yeah. It's an Italian cookie that is enjoyed, you know, at different times of the year, weddings and things, but really known as a Christmas or Easter cookie. Yeah.

I know them as Christmas. I didn't realize they were Easter, but yeah, they're super Italian, and they're so Italian that it shares a root word with pizza. Yeah. Pizze, which means round and flat. Which is pretty impressive that they fit round and flat into just one word. Yeah, that's true. The L in Pizzell means small and the A in Pizza means personal pan. Right. Oh man. Well done. That was pre-thought of. I know, but it means personal pan. Right. Oh man. Well done.

That was pre-thought of. I know, but it was still great. Great delivery. Nothing wrong with writing a joke, my friend. All right. I feel like such a fraud. No, not at all. Traditionally, black licorice or anise

is the traditional flavor, but that's sort of the old world stuff these days. You can flavor it with whatever you want. A lot of chocolate ones, vanilla, lemons are very popular flavor. I saw gingerbread. Oh, sure, I could dip it in this punch. Yeah, sounds good.

I also saw a savory one, lemon dill. I'm not crazy about that, but that was the most exotic one I found. Yeah, I saw an elk one, but that feels a little gamey. No. For real, an elk one? No.

Oh, okay. Because I was going to say, maybe it was a recipe from the Elks. Oh, sure, sure. I get you. So, it's also really simple to make too. It's just like sugar, eggs, flour, maybe butter, maybe olive oil, if you really want to get Italian.

And then like you said, some of those flavorings, and then you make it essentially like an old timey waffle where you have like two irons that usually have some sort of like, like what is it, boss relief emblem or symbol or shape or something like that that the dough cooks into so it transfers the shape to the dough as you're cooking.

Yeah, like the old world way, and I imagine a lot of just sort of traditional Italian families still do it this way. I mean, they make machines like a waffle iron that you could do this in, but is the old school two cast iron plates, like you said, that have those decorative designs. And a lot of times it's a snowflake for Christmas.

Back in the old days, you could get like a family plate made with your whatever about your like your family crest maybe or a special date in your family or anything that's meaningful to your family. Yeah, a picture of your grandma drunk at Christmas. Yeah, sure. And then you can eat that drunk face. And then you cook those over an open flame, you know, like turning it over, you know, each side, each side, let that thing cool off. And then you can do a lot of things with it.

You can roll it up like a cone and put stuff in it. You can just sprinkle it with a little powdered sugar. You can, I saw one where you can use it as a like ice cream sandwich layer. Yeah, the, I don't know where you got this, but there's a Nutella ice cream Pizzelle sandwich. I don't even know if this is a recipe, but you just alternate layers of Pizzelle, Nutella,

and whatever flavor ice cream you want to. Stack it as high as you can get your mouth around, and there you go. And it sounds delicious. Plus also, I mean, like a fresh pozzelle out of some hot iron sounds really, really good. I mean, even a stale pozzelle is still kind of good. I don't think I've ever had one.

Oh, really? You should order some. They're everywhere. Yeah, I figured this time of year, huh? Yeah, I would treat yourself and do an Anise one, the traditional kind. It's actually surprisingly good. I'm not crazy about Anise, but it's good in this context.

And then get something else that you know you're gonna like, like lemon or something. Yeah, I'm gonna see if there's a good Italian bakery in Atlanta, I'm sure there is. But I mean, even if there's not, I guarantee you can find these at like TJ Maxx if you wanted to. Right.

Like they're everywhere. Right behind the blouse aisle. Yeah, sometimes mixed in with the blouses. Ooh, all right, so that's the Pizzel. Should we move on to your Les Bouche de Noël? Yes, I did not expect you to say it like that, but nicely done. How would you say it?

What's the correct way, in other words? I mean, you basically had it, I think not expect you to say it like that, but nicely done. How would you say it? What's the correct way in other words? I mean you basically had it. I think it's bouche the bouche I think so, but I know that bouche also is is mouth No, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm pretty sure so I could be Yeah. Yeah? I'm pretty sure. So I could be mis-saying it. It could be Butchi.

Okay. Le Butchi de Noel. Right. And it's a yule log, but it's an edible yule log, and it's really closely identified with France. Yeah, it is. And it was not something you would eat in the old school tradition in France. What happened, it dates back to medieval times.

And you would get a real log of wood, usually a fruit tree or many times a fruit tree. And you would do that to, let's say you wanted like a good apple harvest for the year to come. So you would use like an apple branch or log. You bring it home, you put that thing in the hearth, and the hearth is sort of where the family hung out. So it's just sort of the centerpiece there. Yeah. And then there were, I think this actually is like a pagan rite even, that they would light this. And it was supposed to last from Christmas through the new year. So at least three days.

If it didn't burn for three days, you did it wrong, and your next year was gonna suck. But if you could at least make it three days, yeah, you were probably going to choke to death on an apple the following year if it didn't make it three days. But if it makes it three days or longer, great. And so to kinda game the system,

usually your Yule log would be damp, like very green, But if it makes it three days or longer, great. And so to kind of game the system, usually your Yule log would be damp, like very green and very large, because that wouldn't be the only thing you're burning. Like you needed to cook, you needed to keep warm, so you had fires going this whole time. So to keep this log going for at least three days, it had to be of a certain type.

Yeah, and I'm not sure if we mentioned, you light it on Christmas Eve. If you've really done your job well and you picked out the perfect log, maybe soaked it a little bit and gamed the system like you said, that thing might burn to the new year. And I would guess the whole family

just celebrates if that happens. Yeah, and the ashes even are, were thought to prevent lightning strikes. So you'd want to cover yourself in it anytime you went out in a rainstorm. I'm guessing They would use the coal and like medicinal preparations All sorts of stuff, right? It was a big deal. The problem is and our friend well, I guess our online friend This person that we whose article we came across, Lucy Rose, on Beyond Brioche on Frenchly.com, wrote a great article about this,

and Lucy Rose said that eventually over time, hearths just kind of started to disappear. Like, so the center of the house, where the Yule log used to kind of do its thing at the end of the year, lost its setting, so people still kind of followed this tradition, but they would just set a log on the dinner table and just look at it. They didn't set it on fire. So it lost a little something.

And then eventually somebody was like, hey, why don't we eat that thing? Let's make an edible version of this and eat it. And that's where the bouche de Noël came from. That's right. That happened's where the bouche de Noël came from. That's right. That happened sometime in the late 1800s. Apparently a gentleman named Pierre Lacam published the first recipe for that in 1890. And it started spreading around to other cultures,

other cultures that either spoke French or just dug what the French were into. And you know, you make it, it's like a jelly roll cake, but you've got buttercream instead of the jelly, and you roll it up and you frost it with a ganache of some kind, and then you try to make it look like bark, like use a fork and kind of scrape along the outside

to make it look a little more like a log. Yeah, and sometimes like the more modern ones, they'll come in all sorts of colors or whatever and they look very sleek like a Swiss cake roll essentially. But the traditional bouche de Noël is like, you can really kind of go to town with it, not just making that bark effect, but you could make additional smaller jelly roll cakes that you roll up and make as like branches coming off of it. Some people go to the trouble of making

meringue or marzipan mushrooms, like little toadstools growing out of it. So cute. Yeah, it is super cute. Like a really well done boucher noel is adorable. So much so that you don't really wanna eat it. But from the description of the ingredients, I would eat it anyway.

Yeah, for sure. And there's actually, it's not that hard to make, and there's some recipes that Lucy Rose recommends. There's one from Le Grand Wheel, which is a legendary French restaurant in New York. They had one published in the New York Times in 1982. Then the other one she recommended came from Jacques Pepin, his classic Boucher Noël.

Didn't get any better than Jacques Pepin. No, and while you're out at those bakeries looking for Pizelle, try a French bakery and see if they have a Boucher Noël, and if they don't, but you really wanna try it, they sell them online too. Yeah, boy, I'm looking at some of these online. These are really lovely.

Yeah, they really are. Don't they look cool? Do you see any with the toadstools? I see the toadstools. I see the little forked bark. Those look nice. But I see someone who somehow managed to make it look like real pine bark.

That looks really great. Yeah. I mean, somebody with the right kind of fork could really go to town. Ha ha ha. So let's move on, huh? All right, so those, yeah, those are the two confections. And so we're gonna hop in our sleigh.

We're gonna ride around up in the stratosphere, atmosphere. Where are we up there? I think the stratosphere right along the edge of space. Okay, perfect. And we will be right back after a little Christmas cheer. after a little Christmas cheer. ["The Christmas Tree March"] Okay, Chuck, so we're talking, I think now we're gonna move on to a segment

on Christmas trees in the White House. That's right. Those of you who don't live in the United States, the White House is where the president lives. That's right. Those of you who don't live in the United States, the White House is where the President lives. That's right. And generally, the President's family lives there, depending on how old the kids are and stuff like that. For sure.

But there are a lot of traditions over the years. You can go to WhiteHouse.gov under the Christmas stuff if you want to look at all these. But I feel like we should maybe concentrate on a few of the more fun ones. The first Christmas tree in the White House that anyone knows about was in the second-floor Oval Room, which was a family parlor and library, in 1889, which was the Benjamin Harrison administration, and they used real candles to delight the grandchildren. Yeah, apparently. So that was 1889 and I think electricity was brought to the lighthouse two years later. The lighthouse? Yeah, I said the White House, didn't I?

You said lighthouse, but I love that. Okay. It made it light. Well, white is a light color. It's the absence of color, actually. So electricity was brought to the White House in 1891, and yet 30 plus, 40 something years later, FDR, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, still celebrated with a Christmas tree lit with candles. Yeah, despite the danger. I think, like you said, 1891 was electricity,

and three years later, Grover Cleveland had the first electrically lit tree. But, you know, Teddy Roosevelt, that guy was old school, if he was nothing else. Well, that was Franklin Roosevelt. Teddy Roosevelt has his own interesting story. Oh, Franklin, of course. He's in older school.

Yeah. Teddy supposedly in older school. Yeah. But yeah, Teddy supposedly banned Christmas trees. That is a bit of a, I think it's just been twisted a bit over the years. I don't think he banned them. It was not a part of their family tradition to have a tree, so he did not. Yeah, that was, I mean, that's it.

There's apparently a huge misunderstanding over the years that he was such a conservationist. I guess historians retroactively reasoned that the reason there wasn't Christmas trees during his administration was because he didn't want them cut down, but the answer is they just didn't celebrate with the Christmas tree. That wasn't their jam,

which is pretty typical at the time. I mean, people having a Christmas tree in your house, when you celebrate Christmas is fairly modern, certainly way more modern than the turn of the last century. Yeah, so it wasn't like everybody was doing it. Although in 1902, Archie Roosevelt did sneak a little small tree, hid it in the closet upstairs even, decorated it and showed

his family and Teddy Roosevelt did not say, get that infernal thing out of here. Apparently he liked it and said, all right, well, the tree can stay. Yes. Which is sweet, you know? Sure. And then there was also a record that was set by Dwight D. Eisenhower in the 50s, I think in 1959, for the greatest number of Christmas trees in the White House at one time. And he really macked it out with 26 Christmas trees in the White House.

And for years and years and years, no one even tried to beat Eisenhower's record until I think, what was it, 1990, when the George W. Bush administration blew it out of the water. Yeah, he was like, I'm gonna take down that record. Read my lips. Hey, great impression. It was so-so, but how many trees did he have? He brought in 47, just blew Eisenhower out of the water.

The Clintons had 32, also beating Eisenhower in 95. And the younger Bush said, I'm going to beat daddy. He did. He brought in two more trees than dad. Yeah. And the Obama said, nice try. Watch us. Hold my beer.

Yeah. 62 trees in 2015. And if you look at all of these different, um, different competing numbers of trees, these records just being broken and beaten and tossed and dashed over the rocks. Um, they all had themes. I think Clinton's had it was the night before Christmas. The first Bush had a Nutcracker ballet theme The Obamas had timeless tradition the second Bush had home for the holidays They all had themes and they were actually following in a tradition set by Jackie Kennedy back in 1961 who created the first

theme Christmas that the Christmas trees were decorated with again Nutcracker. Yeah, that's fine. But it was the first one, so technically, I guess she started the Nutcracker theme. Sure. As all themes. But that wasn't the first tree in the Blue Room. That is traditionally where the official tree is now, in the Blue Room.

That started in 1912 when Robert, Helen, and Charlie Taft, the children of William Howard, put that very first tree in the Blue Room. And they have a competition now internationally. You have to win the state competition first to qualify to see if your tree can be the tree in the Blue Room. And we're just going to go over a few of these leading states now because far and away, well,

not that far and away, but North Carolina has had the most trees since 1961 in the Blue Room with 13. Yeah, I don't know how recent this stat is, but I know that North Carolina was chosen again kind of as a nod to the battering by Hurricane Helene this year. President Biden, I think, chose one from Western North Carolina. Kartner's Tree Farm in Newland, North Carolina

was the one who is sending the White House Christmas tree this year. That's right, and surely not a sympathy pick because like I said, North Carolina pumps out some great trees as they are in the lead. Pennsylvania's in second with 11. Then you have Wisconsin with eight, Washington state with seven,

West Virginia with four, and then basically other states with two or one. Yeah, there was one that was anonymously donated from New England, which sounds suspicious. Yeah. And if you're wondering what kinds of trees, far and away, fir trees lead with 52. There've been seven spruces and one pine.

That's the one that's coming out of Kartners this year too, a Frasier fir. Oh, a fir, so it'll be, I guess that'll be the 53rd? Yeah, whitehouse.gov needs to get on this. Yeah, that's right, update your site already. So yeah, that's it for White House Christmas trees, huh? I think that was a pleasant little journey. Thank you.

Through a political minefield. That's right. Okay, Chuck, it's next, next you. Through a political minefield. That's right. Okay Chuck, it's next, next up. I'm pretty psyched. We're gonna do another two-fer segment, aren't we? Yeah, are we gonna hit these Christmas movies? Yes, but first, how about some more jolly music from our friend Jerry?

["Jolly Christmas Music"] All right, everyone, we're back and we're gonna finish up with a couple of Christmas movies. Well, one a TV special and one not just a Christmas movie, but the er Christmas movie. Yeah, you are, right? I don't know how you spell it. You do. you are. It's like a reference to a city in Sumeria or Mesopotamia or something like that,

like one of the first cities. Oh, look at you, Mr. Smarty Pants. Er. Yeah, we're talking about the first Christmas movies. Shocking stat here, over 150 new holiday movies are produced annually. Yep, 98% of them from Hallmark. Probably so.

Or that may be a real stat, actually. Who knows? It is. They shoot two a days is what they call them. They complete two films from scratch in a day. They should just redress people and recast them and just be like, all right, you're Bill, the local sheriff in this one, and you're Johnny, the local diner owner in this one.

Right, wait, I thought I was Johnny in this one. No, just shut up, wear this. But if you're thinking like, oh, it's a wonderful life, no, no, no, that's the 40s. If you're thinking, all right, March of the Wooden Soldiers, no, no, that's 1934, you have to go all the way back to the very earliest days of putting anything on film to find the inspiration that would lead to the first Christmas movie. Yeah.

It turns out that we're going all the way back to the 1890s. But we should go back a little before then. In France, France apparently, I didn't know this, was like the Ur center of filmmaking. Did you know that? That that's where it originally kind of came out of? Sure, the Lumiere brothers. Yeah, so them, there was a guy named Louis Le Prince who is considered as having filmed the first surviving,

or the oldest surviving motion picture, which you've probably seen before. I know you have, but I'm saying you, the listener. It's a horse running. And it almost looks like a flip book. It's that primitive. And it's referenced, actually. Have you seen that movie, Nope?

Uh, oh yeah, sure. Remember when they show up on the set, they kind of give that spiel about their family and the horses, and they say that that was their ancestor? That's what they're talking about, is that it's just a two second long shot of a horse running with a jockey on it.

I'd like to see that again. Nope or that two second long shot? No wait, all right, I just watched the horse thing again. No, I'd like to see Nope again. I saw that in the theater, but I haven't seen it since and I quite enjoyed it. Yeah, it was pretty good. All right, so that two and 2.1 second horse running,

first thing, a lot of films that followed didn't have a narrative yet. They were just literally, people were amazed that they could just see something moving on film. The Lumiere brothers, very famously in 1896, had a 50-second clip of a train coming right toward the screen. Probably the first and last time a train didn't go through a tunnel to indicate intercourse.

Right. Yeah, they hadn't figured that out quite yet. That was the next year, probably. That's right. But then that first Christmas movie came just a few years later, right? Just two years later after that 50-second clip was called The Arrival of a Train. It really gets across what you're watching. But it was just two years after that, a guy named George Albert Smith became the creator of the very first Christmas movie, uncontested. No one had ever made a Christmas movie before

until George Albert Smith came along and put 76 seconds of goodness on film. That's right, it's called Santa Claus. It's a pretty groundbreaking film at the time. I guess almost anything you did would be groundbreaking at the time. Yeah, but this, he was showing off almost. No, I agree.

It had some pretty decent special effects. It's a story of Santa, very simple story, obviously 76 seconds, but it's Santa visiting the home of two kids on Christmas Eve. You can watch it on YouTube, it only takes 76 seconds plus some dumb ad. But you see two kids checking the chimney for Santa

before either mom or the nanny or somebody puts them to bed. They turn off the lights and then the room is dark and then all of a sudden pops up, the first little special effect is on the right side of the screen a little circular image of the rooftop, like an insert almost, within the film frame itself where you see Santa climbing down a chimney but really just walking down some stairs disguised as a chimney. Yeah, right. And then like once he gets into the chimney or out of that additional shot that's showing him on the rooftop,

all of a sudden he's in the kid's room. And it is, it's like an editing cut, but also it was edited just a little early or a little late so that you can see him coming through the black curtain that he's suddenly appearing from. But again, we're talking 1898, and people were just amazed by this kind of stuff. And then Santa, while the kids are sleeping,

he puts little goodies in their stocking, and he waves goodbye, and then all of a sudden, poof, he's gone again. And I mean, like even watching it now, I'm like, that was pretty cool. I can't imagine being alive in 1898 and seeing that and just being like, oh my God. I can't wait till Polar Express comes out. Yeah.

Movie I still haven't seen. I haven't either. Oh, let's keep it that way. Let's promise, let's do a blood oath that neither one of us will ever see that. I think we also, we talked about that in the Uncanny Valley episode. Oh, sure, we had to have.

I will say this about Santa Claus, the 76 second film. Given that most movies from this era look pretty creepy, and given that every Santa from this era looks really creepy, this Santa creeping through the room over these children, I was ready for this thing to just make my hair stand on end. And it wasn't that bad. A little bit of creep, but it was actually had a little sweetness to it.

Yeah, he was a little slim for a Santa. I think that added to the creepiness. But yeah, no, he was nowhere near the creepiest Santa of his time. But we don't know who this guy is, right? No, he was uncredited, so the first Santa Claus on screen, the first person to play Santa Claus on screen, no one knows, we'll probably never know.

It's not Tim Allen, I know that. No, and shout out to Justin Childress on Edgeland Today, who helped us with this, did some great research, and made a nice little article. All right, how are we gonna wrap it up? Oh wait, we need to get in our sleigh first. Oh, okay, all right, here we go. Hop in the old sled and let's go.

["The Star-Spangled Banner"] ["The Star-Spangled Banner"] Okay, Chuck. Do-da-do-do, do-da-do-do-do. Why do you gotta do that? Do-da-do-do, do-da-do-do-do-do. Did it work? Josh has been giving me that earworm for 16 years on the reg. It just, it works really well. All right, so now I'm annoyed, so let's talk about the sweetest Christmas special of all time. It is sweet. It is sweet.

It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet.

It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet. It is sweet. It is, it works really well. All right, so now I'm annoyed, so let's talk about the sweetest Christmas special of all time. It is sweet, isn't it? Did you watch it? Of course. Okay, so in 1982, Christmas time 1982,

there was a cavalcade of familiar characters who made their debut in Christmas specials, right? Mm-hmm. You had Pac-Man with the classic Christmas Comes to Pac-Land. Something good. The Smurfs Christmas special, which actually is quite good. I was too old for Smurf, so. I went back and watched it like last week or a couple days ago,

and I was like, this is pretty good. Pretty good. All right. And then, far and away, the best of the bunch that came out in 1982 and and among the top ever, Christmas TV specials, if you ask me, was Ziggy's gift, which is, like you said, incredibly sweet. That's right.

Ziggy is the comic strip character, Ziggy, the little short, bald, how old is Ziggy? That was one of my questions. He's timeless, ageless. I mean, is he supposed to be a grownup, though? Yeah, yeah, how old is Ziggy? That was one of my questions. He's timeless, ageless. I mean, is he supposed to be a grown-up, though? Yeah, yeah, he's not a kid. Okay, I couldn't tell because I wasn't into Ziggy, but did some Ziggy research

and looked back at some of the comics. And you know, Ziggy was beloved because Ziggy was great. And Ziggy was sweet and Ziggy was joyful. And Ziggy was not cynical. Ziggy lived with a dog and a parrot and you might find a Ziggy comic strip that was just a little wry joke or you might find a Ziggy comic

that is literally just Ziggy smiling and looking at you and saying hello. Yeah, and so he was like indefatigable even though basically his entire life went wrong at saying hello. Yeah, and so he was like indefatigable even though basically his entire life went wrong at every turn. Yeah. And he like, he could be affected by that. He was put off, he was mad,

he wasn't like he was some sort of smiling automaton, but he returned back to his like upbeat outlook on life very quickly, like that was his default setting. And just reading Ziggy cartoons, it's like it does it to you, you know? It really brings it out. And so Ziggy had been around since, I think, in the paper since 1970. And it built up a pretty good audience by 1982.

So it was a big deal when Ziggy was coming to TV. Tom Wilson, the creator of Ziggy, did a bunch of interviews with different newspapers. And everybody was quite excited that Ziggy was having his own Christmas special. Yeah, for sure, and he really pulled out all the stops, because not only is it a Christmas special, an animated Christmas special,

but it was one that really took the time with the artistry to just knock it out of the park. A typical half-hour animated special at the time had about 35,000 drawings. Ziggy's Gift had close to 140,000 drawings. They usually have about 50 rough sketches to sort of map out the story. There were 1,200 for Ziggy's Gift. And for all of this effort, A, you got an animated special that, for the time, again, when you look back now, really good, smooth, outstanding animation, and it won the Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program that year.

Yeah, it beat Garfield, beat the Smurfs. Take that Smurfs. Yeah, it beat Charlie Brown twice, two different Charlie Brown specials. Good grief. There was just no chance that anybody was gonna beat Ziggy's gift that year. Yeah. Um, and also not just the animation. I mean, like, people, like, animation buffs are like,

this is a classic masterpiece of animation. But the plot, too, was really good. Like, the thing seems longer than 22 minutes. Not like it drags. They just packed a lot into this 22 minutes, even though it just kind of takes its own time. That's great. Um, it's pretty funny. It's longer than 22 minutes, not like it drags. They just packed a lot into this 22 minutes, even though it just kind of takes its own time. That's great.

It's pretty funny in a lot of places. It's sweet throughout, and all this kind of came together and formed this perfect sweet little 22 minute Christmas special. Yeah, absolutely. When it came time to make the special, they were like, what do we do with Ziggy's voice? Like, how do we cast this iconic, silent character?

Because you can really ruin, like, a comic strip character come to life if you don't get the voice right. And so they decided not to use a voice at all, which was brilliant, and apparently, that came from Wilson's daughter, who a few years before said that the reason it's hard to find a voice for Ziggy is because when you read Ziggy, you hear your own voice. Out of the mouths of babes, you know?

Amazing. She was 32 at the time, but... That's great. So, yeah, the whole thing came together to make this really great Christmas special, but what's puzzling about it is it didn't become an enduring classic. Like, the latest I could see on goodoldnewspapers.com was 1986. That's when the TV listings for Ziggy's gift around December just dried up. But the great thing about it,

and the reason why we're doing this, we're covering Ziggy's gift, is there's like a couple of generations out there who don't even know this exists. And are going to be so happy to find this sweet little Christmas special that I hope everybody who's listening, who's never seen it, really enjoys. And if you have seen it, it's been a little while.

If it's been a day, doesn't matter, go watch it again. Because it just gets you every time. Yeah, and get your if it's been a day, doesn't matter, go watch it again. Because it just gets you every time. Yeah, and get your what would Ziggy do t-shirt printed up. Yeah, that's another thing too. You could really get into Ziggy after watching that. And there's a lot of great like vintage Ziggy stuff, like stickers of Ziggy catching a rainbow

in a butterfly net, that kind of stuff. Yeah, and you could, you know, get Ziggy with it. Very nice. There's no way to end this better than that, Chuck. It's my last bad joke of the year. So let's get a little more Christmas music in and then we'll wish everybody Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.

How about that? Let's do it. All right, well that is it for the Christmas special this year. We want to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas or Merry and Happy Holiday of your choice, however you choose to celebrate. Yeah. We're Christmas guys, so that's what we do around here, and I'm wishing you and Yumi and Momo a very Merry Christmas, and Jerry and Dave and Livia

and Dave and Kyle and who else, Ben? Yeah, the whole crew, and back at you too. Merry Christmas to you and Ruby and Emily for sure Yeah, thanks, man. And of course with Jerry her Lovely wife and daughter as well. Yeah, so Merry Christmas to all of you. Happy holidays to all of you from everybody here at stuff You should know we hope it's a great one for you and go watch Ziggy's gift and feel love Merry Christmas, everybody.

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