Twas the night before...

As a kid, I strongly remember the joy of the holiday season. It was obliquely obvious that things were different at this time of year. For starters people started treating each other nicely. Perhaps mindful that "Santa" would not reward bad behavior, even the bullies started acting right. I dare say I received very few beatings in the days leading up to the Christmas break. Trust me: with my big mouth and obnoxious attitude, there was always a chance I would be beaten for no other reason than I was small, smart or a smart ass. These holidays were a big deal, definitely surpassing importance than any other including Easter. Before we were let out from public school for the holidays we were always encouraged to sing Christmas songs prior to the big day. I remember fixating on the image of the jolly, fat Santa Claus riding his sleigh full of toys and other gifts with the flying reindeer led by the red-nosed Rudolf himself. It was all such an awe-filled time in my life. I was happy. Then one Christmas my parents dropped the J-bomb. "You're Jewish," they explained. What? Santa wasn't going to visit me and reward me for being a good child? Hmmmm...this was definitely not right. Who do I see about this? Who will fix it so that Santa would continue to include me on his list for future rides? As it turned out, there was no one to see and Santa never did make it back over to the Smason homestead. Yet, there were gifts. Knowing that withholding toys from boys and girls at that particular part of the calendar year could have a deleterious effect on a fragile child's developing mind, my parents were insightful. They always provided gifts for my sister and me, but they didn't make a big deal about it. They went through the motions of providing gifts, but rarely did they ever have me ask for anything in particular. Since I wasn't technically asking Santa for gifts, it was deemed okay. In any event it was tough being Jewish and trying to understand why Jews were being excluded from the busy end of the holiday. Thank goodness that most years Chanukah and Christmas are in close proximity, unlike this year. When I pressed my folks for an explanation, they told me about recognizing Jesus as the Messiah, but it still didn't make any sense to me as to how and why this would manifest in not having a connection to Santa Claus or his reindeer with the famous crimson muzzle. Although we never had a tree or, as some Reform Jews call it, a "Chanukah bush," one of my great aunts did. Oftentimes family members would gather at my great uncle and aunt's home, thereby allowing her to host Christmas for us as a family. I also remember my favorite Christmas character was Mister Bingle, whose TV show was broadcast every year during the days leading up to the big day. Mister Bingle was created by Maison Blanche in the late 1940s as a way of spurring sales in their department store. The character was purported to be a tiny snowman with a red cherry button for a nose, an ice cream cone for a hat and holly leaves for wings. He had mittens made out of candy cane stripes and carried a candy cane. Though it was never fully explained, he was animated through the magic of the holiday by Santa Claus, whom he served as a helper along with the elves. He was very funny, always got into trouble and was the perfect foil for Christmas comedy to a kid. I always imagined meeting Mister Bingle and years later I did...or at least the chain-smoking, baldheaded store employee who did his character's impossibly high voice improvisations. If anything completely dashed my Christmas memories, that was probably it. Maybe that's why I always feel the need to connect to those simpler times when the joy of being rewarded for being a kid was not caught up in any religious rhetoric or significance. I watch Jean Shepherd's "A Christmas Story" broadcast for 24 hours straight every year over TBS at least once or twice to recall in me of the importance of the holiday to impressionable and wide-eyed kids. Plus, looking at the father in that story going gaga over the "major award" leg lamp reminds me that one doesn't have to outgrow that incredible sense of wonder.

Mister Bingle and Santa vs. Mr. Scrooge and the Grinch

An advertisement for Mr. Bingle, my chilhood Christmas hero

When I was but a mere lad, television was still mostly broadcast in black and white. At holiday time local TV station WDSU broadcast a five-minute holiday message from Mr. Bingle, the icon of the then powerful department store Maison Blanche. 

As legend would have it, Mr. Bingle was a small snowman brought to life by Santa Claus who wore green holly leaf wings, had red and white candy-cane striped gloves and wore an upside down ice cream cone for a hat. This imaginative creature was drummed up as a sales promotion gimmick for Maison Blanche. 

Even the initals for Mister Bingle reminded one of Maison Blanche, then the largest department store in the South. At holiday time when everyone still dressed up to go downtown, my grandmother would take me to the Maison Blanche department store window on Canal Street where special 15-minute shows would take place throughout the day. 

Mister Bingle's voice was that of Oscar Eisentrout, an unlikely cigarette chain-smoking window dresser who was drafted as the voice of the imaginary character back at its inception, suggested as 1947. Oscar's high-pitched voice could best be described as a dwarf inhaling helium. Throughout many years on TV and at the store, Oscar was assisted by many creative individuals. 

The late Al Shea, who passed away a few months ago, was known as the voice of Pete the Penguin, for example. These creative shows carried on even during my tenure at WSMB-AM on the 13th floor of the Maison Blanche Building and lasted until 1985 until Eisentrout passed away. It turns out Eisentrout, like me, was also Jewish, but that didn't stop us from enjoying the spirit of the season.

It was different for me to meet and see Eisentrout as an adult and help him prepare some of his scripts while I worked at the station. When I was a kid, it was all so magical. While my Jewish heritage did not allow me to attach much significance to the religious reasons for the celebration, I was, like all the kids of my age, attracted to the cuddly, cute and sometimes mischievous Mr. Bingle, whose image was emblazoned on the store and oftentimes on all of the holiday shopping bags. The shows truly got me into the spirit of the holiday and I looked forward to meeting Santa and hearing more about his aeronautical sleigh and reindeer. 

The Dr. Seuss book and TV classic "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" starring Boris Karloff was never read or viewed by me as a kid, although I came to appreciate it much more as an adult. Likewise, I read "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens much later in school beyond the time I was a young, impressionable child. So, the images of the two archetype villains who would steal the joy from the holiday were never in my mind until much later in life. 

Today, however, I can't help but summon up all of the collective images of Christmas. Mr. Bingle and my childhood impressions of Santa stand on one side with the Grinch and Ebeneezer Scrooge on the other. It is true that I still get a bit teary-eyed when I watch the immortal "Miracle on 34th Street" starring Edmund Gwenn and a very young Natalie Wood. Others that have come along since that time: Tim Allen in "The Santa Claus," the classic film made in Cleveland of "A Christmas Story" ("You'll shoot your eye out, kid!") and even Billy Bob Thornton's "Bad Santa" have also made impressions (good or bad) that I carry with me today. 

But for me, my fondest childhood memories were watching the small black and white screen and imagining this little puppet and all of his possiblities. How I did enjoy those trappings of the holiday. I am sorry that my son, now grown, never knew the significance of Mr. Bingle nor that more of his generation or others who have followed were never able to experience the magic of the holiday through the hilarious mischief of a happy, high-pitched, flying snowman bearing a slight New Orleans accent.