The Other St. Nick
The Lost Holiday Tradition of St. Nicholas Day; Plus, "On a Toot!": Madison Edition: Drinking High, Low and in the Middle in Wisconsin's Capital.
When I was growing up in a 19th-century farmhouse in the Wisconsin hamlet of Eagle, we had two Christmases every December. There was Small Christmas, which came on December 6th, and Big Christmas, which arrived on December 25.
Small Christmas was indeed small. It only involved our stockings, hung, as one does, by the chimney …