Christmas 2005

2005

 

     First of all, it seemed like it was going to be a proper, old-fashioned December in Chicago, one that promised comparisons with winters of old.

     The snow came early and stayed late--and it was one of the coldest Decembers on record.

     There were two big snowstorms early in the month, dropping six-to-eight inches of snow on parts of the metropolitan area. Then Chicago went into a period of sub-freezing temperatures that didn't break until just about Christmas Eve.

     The result was a gray, cloudy and foggy Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, with a light covering of remaining snow on grassy areas. The forecast called for a high temperature of 36 degrees on Sunday, Christmas Day.

 

     The high cost of staying warm for Christmas was on everybody's mind. Natural gas prices were up 40% over the December of 2004. Applications for low-income heating help in Cook County totaled 120,000 in December, 2005, or two-thirds as much as the total for all of 2004.

 

     The high cost of gasoline, it appeared, would not dissuade millions of people from traveling at least 50 miles to have Christmas dinner with family. The AAA Motor Club was predicting that 63.5 million Americans would make travel part of their Christmas holiday weekend. Eighty-one percent of that group would be going by car, despite the fact that the average cost of a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline in Illinois was up by 26 percent from December, 2004--to a cost of $2.27/gallon.

     And about that Christmas dinner.

     Just when to serve it posed a dilemma for thousands of households. The first-place Bears were playing their arch rivals, the last-place Green Bay Packers, on Sunday, Christmas Day. The kickoff was scheduled for 4 p.m. Should Christmas dinner be before the game? At half-time? After it was all over?  What to do? What to do?

     The fresh Christmas turkey of 2005 cost $1.19/lb at Dominick's. A 64-oz carton of eggnog was $2.50. Safeway Select coffee was $5.99/lb. An 8-inch Mascarpone cheesecake was $8.99.

 

     One of the most compelling news stories of the day was the discovery of newly-born twins on the Wednesday morning before Christmas.

     A custodian at the North Austin Lutheran Church at 1500 N. Mason Avenue found a baby carrier inside the church's vestibule at about 8:15 that morning. Inside were a sleeping baby boy and a sleeping baby girl. They were taken to West Suburban Medical Center in Oak Park, where they were pronounced fit and given the names Joseph and Mary.

     Within two days, the hospital had received close to two dozen calls from people, many of whom wanted to adopt the babies. Some of the calls came from as far away as California.

     On Christmas Eve, however, the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services placed the babies in a registered foster home.

     Under Illinois law, mothers can leave newly-borns without penalty in certain safe havens, like hospitals and fire stations. Churches, however, were not on the list, and at Christmas police were looking for the parents.

 

     It was just before Christmas that the parents of 6-year-old Joshua Woods finally spoke out about the accident that caused the death of their son.

     The Woods family was in their car on Central Avenue at the northwest corner of Midway Airport on a snowy December 6th, when a Southwest Airlines jet crashed through the fence and crushed the car. The plane had been unable to stop after landing.

     Sitting in the living room of their home in Leroy, Indiana, Lisa and Leroy Woods told the Chicago Tribune that the family was having a hard time of it, getting through Christmas without Joshua. "I'm angry towards the pilot and the tower," Mrs. Woods said. "I feel something could have ben done to prevent all this. Why weren't they redirected somewhere else?"

 

     In Iraq, elections had been held ten days before Christmas, but sectarian violence was picking up over the Christmas weekend. On Christmas Day, bombs hit Iraqi army and police patrols and destroyed an American tank in Baghdad. Street protests continued over the results of the election.

 

     American retailers had fewer shoppers in their stores than they had hoped for over the 2005 holiday season. Sales were forecast to improve by only three to three and a half percent.

     But business was brisk for one Chicago department store that was observing its last Christmas with a name that had been synonymous with Chicago for more than 150 years.

     Marshall Field & Co. had been sold to Federated Department Stores earlier in the year, and in September Federated announced that the Field stores would become Macys in September, 2006.

     This didn't sit well with a lot of Chicagoans, who associated Christmas shopping with Field's State Street store and all the ambience that implies, such as lunch under the Giant Tree in the Walnut Room, the Uncle Mistletoe and Aunt Holly characters, and gazing at the wonderful window displays.

     As a result, there was a run on all things Field's, with shoppers jamming the store to purchase every last ornament or trinket that bore the Marshall Field name or pictured its iconic clock. Frango mints were a big-selling item, as well, even though they hadn't been made in the store since the turn of the century.

     Bonnie Miller Rubin of the Chicago Tribune put it this way: "During this final December, many visitors have felt a need not just to savor nostalgia but to marinate in it."

     Federated had decided on the brand name change to facilitate national advertising at its Macy's stores. The company argued that its own poll of Chicago-area shoppers indicated that most people wouldn't mind the change in name. Opponents weren't buying it. They organized a www.keepitfields.org Web site and collected thousands of names on electronic petitions.

     On the Friday before Christmas, Field's was advertising last minute gift ideas, including cashmere gloves ($24.99), hat ($29.99) and scarf ($59.99); a Waterford crystal pierced star ornament ($39.99); a holiday gift basket with cookies, candy & more ($74.99); and the ubiquitous gift of the early 21st century: gift cards, any denomination from $5 to $1,000.

     Some of the most-desired toys of the season were running in short supply. They included the Xbox 360, the interactive Amazing Amanda doll, the electronic I-Dog that hooked up to digital music players, and the two-way radio communicator ChatNow.

 

     In Naperville, Rob Golden was selling copies of the "Leg Lamp" that was made famous in the 1983 movie "A Christmas Story." The lamp resembles a woman's leg in a fishnet stocking with a fringed lampshade atop it that looks like the bottom of a skirt. In the movie it was a "major award" given to the father of the family.

     Golden told the Tribune that he'd been making and selling versions of the lamp for three years. Smaller versions cost $69.99, and large 50-inch versions cost $339.99. For that extra effect, the lamp could be shipped in a wooden crate filled with wood shavings for an extra $149.

 

     The hope of Mayor Richard M. Daley was that his legacy to Chicago would be the 2016 Olympic Games. Just before Christmas, 2005, the Chicago Tribune was reporting that it had learned that the Mayor had privately floated the idea of bringing a second National Football League team to Chicago, one for whom an Olympic-sized stadium could be built. Observers considered it a longshot because of the high cost of such a venture, both in building a stadium and in compensating the Chicago Bears for an encroachment on their territory.

     "This sounds like the ultimate trial balloon that turns into a lead zeppelin," Sports Business Journal editor-at-large Terry Lefton told the Tribune.

    

     Movies of the season included Steven Spielberg's "Munich;" "Rumor Has It" starring Jennifer Aniston, Kevin Costner, Shirley MacLaine and Mark Ruffalo; "The Chronicles of Narnia;" "Casanova," "The White Countess;" "Breakfast on Pluto;" and Steve Martin in "Cheaper by the Dozen 2."

     On Christmas Day there came word that the actress who played the worried wife of Mr. Martini in the Frank Capra classic film "It's a Wonderful Life" had died in Rome. Argentina Brunetti was 98.

     On stage, the Broadway musical "Wicked" was early into its long run at the Oriental Theatre. "Little Women" was playing at the Cadillac Palace. And, as usual, Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" was wrapping up its annual run at the Goodman.

 

     The political polarization of the United States in 2005 was also being played out in an argument over the proper Christmas greeting.

     Some conservatives were taking offense at the secular greeting "Happy Holidays." Talk show personalities made an issue of it, arguing that secularists were trying to take the meaning out of Christmas. Some groups even organized boycotts of retailers whose ads said anything other than "Merry Christmas."

     Others argued that "Happy Holidays" and "Season's Greetings" had been around for more than 100 years, and that it was all a ploy to divert attention away from some of the other issues that were plaguing Republicans.

     Most Americans seemed to be in the middle, however, thinking that the entire argument seemed rather ridiculous.

    

     For years, one of the controversies in America's suburbias has been the replacement of perfectly adequate homes with what are dubbed by some as "McMansions," oversized domiciles that dwarf their neighbors and fill up nearly every square foot of available lot space.

     One result of this trend was noted in December, 2005: the sale of giant Christmas trees to go into the great, high-ceiled living rooms of these mansions had steadily been on the rise. Marshall Stacy, the owner of the Pinetum farm in Maryland, told the Washington Post that sales of trees taller than 10 feet had been increasing three to five percent a year for the past ten years.

     Such giant trees were selling from $100 to $1,000--and they also required new, giant tree stands, and in some cases, oversized ornaments.

 

     Some Christmas facts from various government agencies:

     --1.9 billion, the number of Christmas cards sent to friends and loved ones every year;  

     --20.8 million, Christmas trees that were cut in the nation in 2002, the latest year for which figures are available;

     --$561 million, the value of Christmas tree ornaments imported to the US from China between January and August, 2005.