As Christmas Day draws closer and closer, many people, if not most, begin to dread leaving their homes. The holiday, with its merriment and festivities, also brings crowds, traffic, a complete lack of open parking spaces, sold-out department store shelves and all-out stampedes to get the lowest prices on Christmas gifts.
But a few Danville residents remember a time when things were just a bit different.
The early 20th century
In 1913, the year Mary Baker was born, the most popular Christmas gifts for children in America were fruit, nuts and candy. The world teetered on the brink of World War I, a conflict that would all but halt international commerce and make sugar and fruit nearly impossible to come by.
For Baker, this describes her childhood Christmas memories to a tee. As a small child, she remembers getting oranges, apples, bags of assorted nuts and small bags of candy in her stocking.
Baker was one of the fortunate. Being the daughter of a shoe store owner in Danville meant her family had more money than most.
“We were very blessed,” she remembered. “We didn’t have a lot, necessarily, but we always had enough. We were happy.”
Baker recalls her excitement at getting an orange on Christmas morning, a treat that was so rare it was nearly priceless to children at the time. Stockings were for decoration only in her family, Baker said, and recalls that she and her five siblings received their goodies in brown paper bags instead.
“Back then, you couldn’t just get fruit like you do now,” she said. “Today, children have fruit all the time, but we didn’t.”
Being from a more affluent family, Baker said she and her brothers and sisters would also get presents for Christmas. Many families around her, she recalled, weren’t so lucky.
“We got presents, usually just one or two things we really wanted,” Baker said. “But there were limits. Daddy didn’t get us everything we asked for. We got enough.”
For one Christmas, Baker said all she wanted was a wrist watch. For another, a pair of roller skates.
“One year, when I was 16, I got my first pair of high heels,” Baker said. “They were patent leather. Daddy told me I could wear them, but only if I made sure not to fall.”
Not having to buy many presents was in some ways convenient, Baker said, since few people at the time owned cars. Henry Ford’s “Model T” automobile had been in production since 1908, but few people in Danville actually owned such a luxury. Most people walked, used bikes, or rode street cars — a trolley-like form of public transportation, Baker said.
“We always had a nice car, so that helped,” she recalled. “But many people didn’t. We were very lucky.”
There were no shopping frenzies, no angry feuds in grocery stores, Baker said. Most people shopped simply and briefly for the few things they could afford, all in quiet, friendly peace.
“I miss that,” she said. “You didn’t have the crowds you have today, and all the running around. You were never too busy to stop and talk to your friends. I miss the friendliness.”
The 1920s
Born in May of 1922, the only apple product Evelyn Gibson got for Christmas was a Red Delicious in her stocking. She remembers it was one of her most prized gifts.
“We would get fruit in our stockings, and nuts, and maybe a little bit of candy,” she remembers. “We were so grateful for it.”
Gibson’s parents met and married in Danville, but moved to a rural town in the mountains of North Carolina before she was born. Her father was a farmer, and had little money to spend on Christmas gifts, Gibson said.
“Sometimes we would get a little toy or something small,” Gibson said. “But sometimes, all we would get was the stocking. That was our present.”
Being from a family with seven children and not much money, Gibson said she remembers she and her siblings were “thrilled” just to have their stockings every year.
“We didn’t have much money, so you were just satisfied with what you got,” she explained.
“We didn’t know anything about fancy things,” she added. “So we didn’t miss them, because we never had them.”
In addition to her stocking, Gibson said she sometimes received clothes for Christmas. While many people during that time bought clothes from catalogs like the Sears and Roebuck, Gibson’s family didn’t have that kind of money. Instead, her mother would pick dresses and shirts from the catalog and make them herself.
Even with their limited funds and sparse gifts, Gibson’s family celebrated Christmas with the one thing they had in spades — family. From chopping down their own cedar tree to decking the halls with homemade popcorn strings and clusters of pinecones collected from the yard, the Gibson family made sure the holiday was as festive as they could make it.
“We were happy,” Gibson remembered. “We were taught the meaning of Christmas. I think some people have forgotten that today.”
The 1940s
At the age of 19, Gibson moved to Danville to work as a weaver at Dan River Inc. There she met Louis Gibson Sr. who was also a weaver at the mill. The couple married in 1943.
Gibson raised all three of her children in Danville, where life — and the Christmas season — was distinctly different than in the mountains of North Carolina. Still, options for shopping were limited compared to today.
“We didn’t have malls,” Gibson said. “All the shops were on Main Street, and that was it.”
Without one-stop-shop megastores like Walmart, Target and JC Penney’s, Gibson had to rely on dime stores, corner markets and a handful of clothing stores to buy Christmas presents for her children. Johnson’s Department Store, L. Herman Department Store, Frances Kahn’s clothing store and Evelyn’s Dress Shoppe were among the few choices customers had for buying presents.
Gibson remembers riding the bus and walking long distances in order to shop for gifts; $100 would buy gifts for her entire family back then, she said. “We would limit it to five presents for each of our children,” Gibson explained. “And they weren’t all big things.”
Today
Things are different today, though, Gibson said. With five grandchildren and four great-grandchildren, Gibson said she’s seeing the desire for bigger, newer, more expensive “toys” reach new heights.
“Today it’s all about the presents,” she said. “Some people still remember, but others have lost the meaning of Christmas. That’s not what Christmas is about.”
Baker agreed, saying Christmas has become more about “stuff” than about generosity and thankfulness.
“Kids these days, they have too much,” she said simply. “Christmas presents are fine, and I’m guilty of it, too. But when you get everything you wanted, you don’t appreciate it.”
“When we were young, we appreciated what we had, because it wasn’t much,” Baker added. “Christmas was about family and being together, and enjoying what you had. I wish people still did that.”
Hughes reports for the Danville Register & Bee.
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