Over Commercialization of Christmas

Christmas was one of my favorite holidays, but not for the gifts. After the Thanksgiving holiday, the stores, schools and homes would be transformed into a different world: a winter wonderland.  Even the radio stations would delight us in playing holiday songs mixed in with their regular tunes.  At home the barrel with the Christmas tree along with the boxes of decorations was brought up from the basement.   Then we had fun placing ornaments and lights on the tree, setting out the home made ceramic nativity scene on top of the console television set, and placing the Elf on the Shelf (yes, we had one in the 1970s).  We did our shopping in December; our parents would take us kids to the local Woolworth to shop for each other. 

Due to the over commercialization of Christmas, it is now off my list of holidays. The retail sector has now overrun Halloween and Thanksgiving by pushing out Christmas items in October. Even worse is the home shopping networks, they start in July with their Christmas in July show on the 25^th and they continue to have segments dedicated to the Christmas holiday up to December 24.  There are some radio stations that switch over from their normal programming to Christmas music 24/7 at the beginning of November. Shopping malls now have Santa arrive two weeks before Thanksgiving.  There are more and more television specials and movies being shown.  Does anyone need to spend money on a manufactured gift?

I miss getting homemade gifts. As a child I received several items knitted by relatives. As for the siblings, we kept those gifts simple.  These were the gifts which were chosen because the person truly thought about me.  Going into the public history field, I believe that those in the field should think about the presents they give to family and friends. We should end the overspending and donate the money one to historical societies that are underfunded.