The slim orange book on the shelf had the title The Untold Adventures of Santa Claus, but it was the author's name — Ogden Nash — that got my attention. What's this, I thought? It might be quite a find!
Well, no. The writing is uneven and not that funny, but the four-color illustrations by Walter Lorraine, from 1964, are notable. Here are a few.
The basic premise of the book is that the narrator (Nash?) meets a misplaced elf or Santa minion who tells a few stories of his time with Santa. Here's the elf as he falls from the aurora borealis:
The first story was the most interesting, giving Santa credit for George Washington's victory over the British when he crossed the Delaware on Christmas eve. Here's Washington writing to Santa from his tent at Valley Forge (with freezing soldiers outside among the pine trees):
Santa joins the troops in their rowboats:
Once Santa and the soldiers get across the river, they find the Hessians drunk and unprepared:
So sure of themselves are these arrogant gentry
They have sent out only a single sentry.
As he is pacing the frozen shore
He hears the splash of a stealthy oar.
He hollers
(In Hessian),
"Who goes there?"
Fun facts: the illustrator, Walter Lorraine, was a long-time designer and later editor at Houghton Mifflin who worked with James Marshall (writer and illustrator of George and Martha), edited The Giver by Lois Lowry, and brought David Macaulay's Cathedral to market. (Source: a 1998 interview in Hornbook with Leonard S. Marcus)
If you want to see spreads from more of the Ogden Nash book, this website has scans of several spreads.
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