A Visit from St. Nicholas, aka The Night Before Christmas
A large collection of antique “Twas The Night Before Christmas” (”A Visit From St. Nicholas”) books and publications is reprinted below. “A Visit from St. Nicholas” (also known as “A Visit of St. Nicholas”, “The Night Before Christmas” or “Twas The Night Before Christmas”) was first published anonymously in the Troy Sentinel (New York) on December 23, 1823 and was reprinted for a number of years without attribution. In 1844 Clement Clarke Moore claimed authorship (see below for a scan of Poems which was the first publication of Moore’s own claim to authorship) himself in one of his books of poems. The first currently known credit to Moore was the December 25, 1837 edition of the Pennsylvania Inquirer and Daily Courier which credited “Professor Moore” as the author.
We reprint hundreds of scans from Christian Riley’s SantaClaus.com collection of A Visit from St. Nicholas for the enjoyment of people around the world (if you wish to link to material from SantaClaus.com, VisitFromStNicholas.com or TheNightBeforeChristmas.com we kindly ask that you note it). Both SantaClaus.com and TheNightBeforeChristmas.com reprint selected versions of the poem as the shear number of editions reprinted here may be considered overwhelming by some. However, as we fully scan in the entire collection, we believe that as people’s tastes in food varies, so may their tastes in favorite adaptions of the poem. Likewise, as the three sites contain the largest collection of “The Night Before Christmas” scans on the internet, it may be useful for those interested in the history of the poem to have a complete collection available.
If you would like to discuss The Night Before Christmas, the SantaClaus.com Christmas forums are the perfect place.
Would you like to include a scan that you don’t see here? If it is pre-1923, then we would love a full scan of the book. If it is pre-1964, it may be out of copyright so if you have a scan we can probably check. If it is post 1963, then it is not out of copyright, but a scan of the cover would be useful, discuss The Night Before Christmas with us here.
The names represent the following:
1837-3-14-New-York Mirror-Dec-23
1837 – the year, followed by a number indicating the # published, 3 being the 3rd item for that year
14-The number from Nancy Marshall’s bibliography (if it is followed by an “s” it is similar but not identical)
New York Mirror – Publication, followed by date if available.
We are adopting a “year-number” format in order to facilitate referencing the books while allowing for additions that are as yet unknown. The numbers from Nancy H. Marshall’s bibliography are included for reference.
Copies may be available at Biblio, AbeBooks – Rare Books, or Alibris if you are interested.
Without further ado, here are the scans, clicking on a thumbnail will bring up a full sized image:
