Santa Clause

English

Proper noun

Santa Clause (plural Santa Clauses)

1. Alternative form of Santa Claus
   • 1978, Calvin Fletcher, “December 1857”, in The Diary of Calvin Fletcher, volume 6, page 153:

     ...each a good knife & some candy & put in their stockings for Santa Clause.

   • 1906, Gideon E. Henderson, Matthew Parkinson, editors, The Canadian Teacher‎^[1], page 511:

     I can only sympathize with a teacher whose conscience is of such extreme dimensions that the corroboration of the "Santa Clause myth" causes a pang; and I should surely....I hope that few teachers of our fair Canada are burdened with such a troublesome conscience as your correspondent of Dec. 1st. Let us have Santa Clause in all his magnificence.

   • 1908 December 17, The Jeannette Dispatch‎^[2], Little Folks Write Good Old Santa Claus, page 9:

     The section features several letters from children addressed to Santa. 14 letters are addressed "Dear Santa Clause", two are addressed "Dear Santa", and one is addressed to "Dear Old Santa Claus", which also mentions him by his full name two more times with the same spelling.

   • 1910, Lenora Makelim, “Christmas Suggestions.”, in The Oregon Countryman‎^[3], volume 3, pages 40–41:

     But since at times it is almost impossible to get at that time of the year, it became necessary to use some other methods of receiving and distributing the many presents from Santa Clause...Under the breakfast plate on Christmas morning a note is often placed, telling where Santa Clause has hidden the first present...There is a Christmas plum pudding made over a wire frame, covered with brown burlap and with raisins sewed on for decoration. This makes an excellent receptacle for the things brought by Santa Clause...

   • 1915, James Whitcomb Riley, “What "Old Santa" Overheard”, in Riley Songs of Friendship‎^[4], page 161:

     Old Santa Clause, and him be me...They wuz no Santa Clause when he...

   • 1920, The Virginia Reel‎^[5], Virginia Reel, Incorporated, page 19:

     ...Was the chance that I might see Santa Clause....For you see my time has come, I'm Santa Clause.

   • 1922, Silas Xavier Floyd, Alice H. Howard, “A Christmas Present.”, in The New Floyd's Flowers Illustrated Stories Especially Arranged for Colored People‎^[6], Austin Jenkins, page 184:

     Susie wiped away the tears, and turned to look out of the window. Perhaps she said to herself, "perhaps Santa Clause has something for me after all!" Now, the sad, really dreadful part about it was that Santa Clause didn't have one single thing for Susie in his pack.

   • 1934, Pacific Telephone Magazine‎^[7], Fun For All, page 11:

     Dear Santa Clause: It would please me very much for you to send me a flashlighter.

   • 1974, Eliot Wigginton, The Foxfire Book, volume 1, Anchor Press, page 16:

     ...and hope my dad and brothers Snake out tan bark to get a little money to buy things with One Xmas Santa Clause gave us three or four sticks of candie and a ornge^[sic]

   • 1984, Richard Gordon, The Bulldog and the Bear: A Play in Two Acts‎^[8], S. French, page 74:

     I understood all about Santa Clause, the baby Jesus and everything.

   • 1990, Shlomo Slonim, editor, The Constitutional Bases of Political and Social Change in the United States‎^[9], Praeger, page 77:

     A year later, in Lynch v. Donnelly, the city of Pawtucket, Rhode Island had erect a large Christmas display each holiday season in a privately owned park. This display included a Santa Clause house, reindeer, a Christmas tree, and carolers...

   • 1990, Emily Carr, Nan Cheney, Humphrey N. W. Toms, “22 December 1940”, in Doreen Walker, editor, Dear Nan‎^[10], page 281:

     If we only remembered it was Christmas & not Santa Clause day.

   • 2001, Bonnie Gulan, Story Lady, chapter 2, in Lost Adventures of the House of the Seven Cats‎^[11], page 24:

     "Well, Nutty Buddy's sick, too sick to have Santa Clause," said Yabbett. "Hope I'm not too young to have Santa Clause." She questioningly looked to Sam. "No you're not, twirp. No one's too young for Santa Clause." And Yabbett, leaning a bit closer to Sam, whispered very low, "Is Molly too old for Santa Clause?" "No twirp, no one's too young for Santa Clause and no one's too old for Santa Clause."

   • 2001, William D. Noe, Roberta J. Noe, Odds and Ends‎^[12], Xlibris Corporation LLC, page 163:

     "Santa Clause?" Ellen asked, then rolled her eyes at her own question, "I mean, yes, sure, every kid learns about Santa Clause." "No," Mr. Stevens' smile faded and he plucked the leaf from the tree, “Every kid doesn't learn about Santa Clause, because every adult knows that Santa is a 'make believe', and overused flying, ho-ho-ho commercial."

   • 2012, Fernan M. Gruber Jr., Santa's Reindeer Hay‎^[13], AuthorHouse, page 2:

     "I think I saw Santa Clause." the child said, pushing up on her arms to eventually sit upright, her feet under her.

   • 2020 November 26, Coach Kie, Just Call Me Nicholas: The Story of How Santa Clause was Born‎^[14]:

     The book repeatedly spells the name as 'Clause', including on the title and back cover: Do you know that Santa Clause is a real person? Do you know the true story of where Santa Clause [...] Just Call Me Nicholas, The Story of the Birth of Santa Clause will answer all of those questions and more. From Coach Kie’s Kid Collection comes this timeless lovely story about the birth of Santa Clause dating all the way back to the beginning.

   • 2022 December 20, “Letters to Santa”, in The Northside Sun‎^[15]:

     Dear: Santa Clause. I wish you a merry Cristmas! Can you give me all big, small, and tiny meemeows I don’t have? [...] Dear Santa, Thank you for sending Wrinkle too! For Christmas I would like a black kitten. (PLEASE!!) Was there a Santa Clause before you?

   • 2022 December 21, “Letters to Santa Claus”, in Gazette-Journal‎^[16]:

     Dear Santa Clause, Thank you for the clothes you brought me last year. How are you and Mrs. Clause doing?

   • 2022 December 23, “Santa Clause comes early for one lucky person”, in City of Ballarat‎^[17]:

Usage notes

• Due in part to the standardization of the Santa Claus spelling in pop culture and modern media, in addition to children in general being more likely to misspell words or names due to their age, the Santa Clause spelling is now often regarded as another such misspelling or typo, although numerous 'letters to Santa' printed in newspapers show that the spelling is still used by some children who otherwise spell all other words correctly. Use of the Santa Clause spelling is also sometimes attributed to children seeing the titles of the Santa Clause series of movies and not realizing the intended pun, resulting in them associating the spelling with the character instead. This may be true in some modern cases of its use, but there are also numerous examples of the spelling being used long before the movie existed.