A Letter That Never Made It to Santa

 

1928 Santa Selfie from the Kingsport Times.

In 1955 WKPT radio announced that the station would be reading letters to Santa over the air and then forwarding them on to Santa at his North Pole address.

This was very exciting to those of us in lementary school. In the past we kids had no surefire method to get our requests straight to the man with all the toys. Oh, sure we knew that the post office was set to deliver them. There were stories every year about how the post office took on extra workers just to handle all the mail to the North Pole.

But those stories were always a little fishy.

How did you know that those workers didn’t just throw the letters away? How would a kid know Santa did get his letter unless maybe he got a lot of stuff he didn’t ask for and didn’t want, like handkerchiefs and underwear and that sort of stuff.

But to have your letter to Santa read over the airwaves, well, that was a cinch that Santa would know what you wanted.

I mean everybody in Kingsport listened to WKPT. They had the Lone Ranger and Sleepy Joe and the Five O’Clock Shadow. Surely Santa listened too.

W.B. Greene's ad from 1955.

So I sat down and composed my letter:

“Dear Santa

“I am eight years old. For Christmas I want a Captain Space Solar Port, a Mandrake the Magician Magic Set, and a sheriff office that is 5 ft. 2 in. high. I would like a few surprizes also. I hope I am not asking too much.

“Love,

“Vincent Staten Jr.

I addressed the envelope carefully:

“Santa Claus

“W.K.P.T.

“Kingsport, Tenn.”

Then I gave it to my dad to mail.

And I waited.

Every night at 6:30 I would turn on our radio and listen to the “Santa Claus” show, which ran right before “Sleepy Joe.”

It seemed like they read letters from every kid in my third grade class, every kid at Johnson Elementary. Every night was like a Johnson roll call: Freddie, Bruce, Janice, Larry, Mary, Mike, Marty, Richard, Don, Diane, Betty, Brenda.

But no Vincent, never Vincent.

Frankly, I was getting worried. This was in the days before text and before email. I knew that once W.K.P.T. read my letter they would have to send it on to the North Pole.

What if it didn’t get there in time? What would I get from Santa? A crummy fruit basket? A stupid belt?

I asked my dad if there wasn’t something he could do, he seemed to know everybody in town. He was manager of the Shoe Department at Penney’s then. Surely he knew someone at W.K.P.T.

Get my letter on, please, please.

He said he’d see what he could do. Then he gave me hope: “Maybe they read it the night we were at your Uncle Albert’s in Johnson City.”

Yes, that had to be it. I had sent my letter in plenty of time.

They’d read it that one night we were out of town.

I slept better. Even on Christmas Eve.

And I awoke on Christmas morning to find a Captain Space Solar Port under our tree. And a Mandrake the Magician Magic Set. And a letter from Santa explaining that he was out of the sheriff’s office and would try to bring it next Christmas.

Good enough for me.

Captain Space Solar Port

And that made 1955 one of the merriest Christmases of my young life.

How do I know all this, how do I remember exactly what I asked Santa for in 1955?

Well, the other day I was cleaning out some of my father’s old files and an envelope tumbled out.

It was addressed:

“Santa Claus

“W.K.P.T.

“Kingsport, Tenn.”

And there was a letter inside.

My father had never mailed my letter.

But somehow Santa got my Christmas wish after all.

 

 

The next year I started marshalling my evidence in early December. From off-hand references on sit-coms to variety show jokes, I had a brief prepared to present to my mother: There was no Santa Claus. She and my father bought the presents, put them under the tree, my father drank the milk and ate the cookies. She wrote Santa’s letter to me – it was her unmistakable handwriting. Besides we wouldn’t even build a fire in our fireplace. No fat man would have been able to squeeze down it.

But on the way to Airing My Grievances (long before Festivus), I had an Epiphany. A Christmas Revelation: if I brought down the Santa Charade, I would be forfeiting extra presents.

So I ditched my presentation.

And Santa arrived that Christmas. And the next. And the next. Until he arrived with a knowing wink: I knew and they knew I knew but it still made for a wonderful Christmas morning.

So here I sit in my dotage…and I still believe.

 

 

The Kingsport Times began running Letters to Santa in December 1919: 

SANTA CLAUS GETS THREE LETTERS HERE

Times Receives Communications From Kingsport Children for Christmas Gifts.

Santa Claus has three letters addressed to him in care the Kingsport Times. They were received yesterday and are signed by Wanda Massengill, "a little girl 7 years old;" Waneta Massengill, "a little girl 5 years old," and Carvel Massengill, "a little boy 3 years old.”

Santa Claus, of course, is still at his toy factory in the Arctic, and the letters have been sent to him, as will all communications addressed to him care of The Times by the little boys and girls of this section. The last information this office received from Santa was that he was hard at work preparing Christmas gifts for the little boys and girls who have teen good, and that his reindeers had got good and fat during the summer off a special shipment of Greenland moss which had been sent to him in bales.

The letters written to Santa by the Massengill children were as follows:

“Dear Santa: I am a little girl 7 years old. I want you to bring me a doll. a doll carriage, some candy, nuts and fruits. Yours truly,

"WANDA MASSENGILL."

“Dear Santa: I am a little girl 5 years old. I want a doll carriage, a set of dishes, a little house, a table, candy, nuts and fruits. Don't forget papa and mamma. Your little girl,

"WANETA MASSENGILL.”

“Dear Santa: I am a little boy 3 years old. I want a wagon, horn, a box of peanut candy and fruits and nuts. Yours truly,

"CARVEL MASSENGILL.”

 

 

The newspaper still runs Letters to Santa