Season of Joy: Chicago Celebrates the Holidays

by Jim Benes

For the last five years, the book "Chicago Christmas: One hundred years of Christmas Memories" has connected many Chicagoans, natives and transplants, with memories of the faces and places of their... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0940895528
• ISBN13: 9780940895522
• Release Date: January 2005
• Publisher: Cornerstone Press Chicago
• Length: 466 Pages
• Weight: 1.86 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 7.1" x 10.0"

Customer Reviews

Season of Joy is a year-round gift

"Season of Joy" takes a multidimensional approach to the subject of how Chicagoans celebrated Christmas from 1674 until the present. It's packed with heartwarming descriptions of the rich helping the poor, and families coming together over dinner tables loaded with roast turkey, glazed vegetables, and plum pudding, while a gift-ringed Christmas tree glitters and winks in the background. Benes goes beyond recounting acts of philanthropy, family dinners, and generic holiday customs, however. He focuses on Chicago-specific traditions such as the gigantic Marshall Field's Christmas Tree, which made its first appearance in the elegant Walnut Room in 1907, the Cinnamon Bear radio serial, and the Apollo Chorus, which has been performing Handel's "The Messiah" yearly since 1879. The book is not confined to Yuletide stories alone. There are also encapsulated versions of the general news that occupied the minds of residents during the Christmas season: on Christmas Eve 1921, Sacco and Vanzetti were denied a new trial, setting off worldwide complaints about miscarriage of justice, while the December 19, 1941 edition of the Tribune declared that "Nazis Can't Kill Santa!" It was referring to a party that American soldiers in Britain were holding for young raid victims. In addition, each year's popular songs, live shows, movies (during later years), and gift prices are recounted. "Season of Joy" can be appreciated as a history book or as holiday reading. For me, it was both.

It's not just about Christmas

Jim Benes' "Season of Joy" is a book of surprises providing the reader with insights into life in America (Chicago, specifically) which go far beyond the customs of celebrating the holiday. The author weaves together a colorful pattern of stories about the social, artistic, political and economic life of one of America's great cities. As diverse as the stories are, they come together to produce a yearly snapshot. Reading through them causes the reader to reflect on how things change, and how they stay the same. Often, there is a strange and moving juxtaposition between tragic realities and recurrent joys of life. Christmas - the season of joy - is the constant, but it is seen in the context of any ever changing world. You can start anywhere in this book. (I started with the year I was born.) Go from front to back, back to front, or skip around, and you will surely find yourself reminiscing and pondering where we've been. This book is not just for Christmas. I highly recommend it to all interested in the culture of the United States. Fred Neuschel