“Unveiling the Secret: The Surprising Destination of Santa’s Letters Revealed!”
Essentially, it was common to use Santa as a way to get better obedience from the littles, not unlike today really where, as Christmas approaches, many a parent leverages the whole “he knows if you’ve been good or bad” thing to manipulate kids to better behavior. For example, to encourage them to not tell lies, via telling the kids Santa Clause is watching them… for some reason even when they are sleeping… which we’re guessing has nothing at all to do with kids’ propensity to get out of bed after being tucked, despite their parents telling them not to. On that note, also that Santa won’t bring them the presents they have asked for if they don’t do as they are told. Bringing in the other tried and true staple of parenting- bribing the little ankle biters.
Incorporating yet another long time staple of parenting, physical violence against their person, one of the first known images of Santa Claus in the U.S. was not a jolly old fellow, but rather an 1810 depiction of him holding a switch over a crying child. Another early depiction shows him leaving a beating rod as a gift, with a note telling the parents to use it on said child with impunity whenever he strays from a virtuous path- the gift that keeps on giving the whole year.
As the century progressed, things became a little less abusive, for instance we have this mid-19th century example of a letter written by Fanny Longfellow, who wrote to her kids from Santa about various ways they could improve, such as, “You have picked up some naughty words which I hope you will throw away as you would sour or bitter fruit… Try to stop to think before you use any, and remember if no one else hears you God is always near.”
