Figure 1.--There is little doubt that the favorite holiday for most American children is Christmas. Here the principal factor is of course all the decorations and loot that comes with the holiday. Herecwe see two happy brothers posing with their Christmas windfall, probably in the 1950s.

The tidied up image pn the previous page with the kids all spruced up is of course not what happened on Christmas morning in Amerivan homes (figure 1). What really happens is the kids wake up before or after mom and still in theior pajamas begin to tear into the presents under the tree. Now this varies from family to family. In some homes the parents cointrol what is happening. They may carefully pass the presents out one by one and everyone can enjoy the opening of each present. And the opposite end of theis neaured approach is the children attacking the pile of presents to get to the loot. Ther might be a frenzy of chaotic fury with paper and ribbons flying every which way. And somwwhere between these two extemes are the millions of American families With their own traditions and approaches. All linds of factors are invbolved such as the age and number of the children, family affluence, parental upntinging, trligion and much more. All of this was raely captured by the camera until the mid-20th century when flashbulbs amd point and shoot cameras made indoors photography nearly foolproof. And thus we begin to get imges of what was happening under the tree.

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Created: 7:08 AM 6/22/2020
Last updated: 7:08 AM 6/22/2020