Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus
Written in response to a letter by eight-year-old Virginia O'Hanlon asking whether Santa Claus was real, the editorial was first published in the New York newspaper The Sun on September 21, 1897.
Though initially reluctant to do the same, The Sun soon began regularly republishing the editorial during the Christmas and holiday season, including every year from 1924 to 1950, when the paper ceased publication.
Before the outbreak of the American Civil War he had worked in journalism, first at his father's New-York Chronicle and later at the New York newspaper The Sun.
[4] In 1897, The Sun was one of the most prominent newspapers in New York City, having been developed by its long-time editor, Charles Anderson Dana, over the previous thirty years.
"[8] O'Hanlon later told The Sun that her father thought the newspaper would be "too busy" to respond to her question and had said to "[w]rite if you want to," but to not be disappointed if she got no response.
[14] Mitchell reported that Church, who was initially reluctant to write a response, produced it "in a short time"[1] during a single afternoon.
[15] Church's response was 416 words long[16] and was anonymously[17] published in The Sun on September 21, 1897,[18] shortly after the beginning of the school year in New York City.
[17] This sometimes led to inaccuracies: a republication in December 1897 by The Meriden Weekly Republican had attributed authorship to Dana, saying that the editorial could "hardly have been written" by any other employee of the paper.
Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond.
O'Hanlon continued to say that while she was initially very proud of her role in the editorial's publication, she eventually came to understand that "the important thing was" Church's writing.
"[34] Journalist David W. Dunlap described "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus" as one of the most famous lines in American journalism, placing it after "Headless body in topless bar" and "Dewey Defeats Truman".
[30] The story of Virginia's inquiry and the response from The Sun was adapted in 1932 into an NBC-produced cantata, making it the only known editorial set to classical music.
[39][40][42] In the 1989 drama Prancer, the letter is read and referenced multiple times, as it is the favorite piece of literature of the main character, whose belief in Santa Claus is vital to her.
[43] The 1991 live-action television film Yes, Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus starring Richard Thomas, Ed Asner, and Charles Bronson, was also based on the publication.
[39] The 2009 animated television special Yes, Virginia aired on CBS and featured actors including Neil Patrick Harris and Beatrice Miller.
[47] The historian and journalist Bill Kovarik described the editorial as part of a broader "revival of the Christmas holiday" that took place during the late 19th century with the publication of various works such as Thomas Nast's art.
[48] Scholar Stephen Nissenbaum wrote that the editorial reflected popular theology of the late Victorian era and that its content echoed that of sermons on the existence of God.
[49] A 1914 editorial in The Outlook, building on The Sun, saw Santa Claus as a symbol of love, part of a child's developing image of God.
In 2005, Campbell wrote that the editorial, particularly The Sun's reluctance to republish it, could offer insight into the broader state of American newspapers in the late 19th century.
"[31] Members of the Christian Reformed Church in North America in Lynden, Washington criticized it in 1951 for encouraging Virginia to think of her friends as liars.
