Published by The Evansville Courier

Just before Christmas in 1898, society writer Sarah Law suggested to Courier co-owner Howard Roosa (her future husband) that something should be done that year for Evansville's poor children.

Courier employees and friends together raised $163 and set out to purchase toys, books, candy and fruit from local retailers who provided the items at a discount.

On Christmas Eve, three horse-drawn carts (one driven by editor Roosa) set out about 5 p.m. to deliver the gifts to the homes of needy children. It is written that the job was bigger than anticipated, and the deliveries continued on Christmas Day.

The next year The Courier established a special fund and the first annual party took place in Downtown's Evans Hall (now the site of Central Library). The children gathered there on Christmas Day to enjoy special entertainment and choose from a pile of toys sitting along the footlights at center stage.

Capt. Jeff Williams of the Green River Packet Co. provided a Christmas tree for that first yule party and continued to supply trees for the next 40 years.

As time passed, Courier staffers handed down the many tasks involved in putting on the growing event. Area merchants and supporters soon began to help with the parties while local entertainers - and some traveling vaudevillians - provided special programs for the children each year.

Courier artist Karl Kae Knecht directed the stage entertainment from 1906, when he joined The Courier, until the last Christmas party in 1942.

The event was moved to the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Coliseum in 1917 to include more children. During the Depression years, two parties were needed to accommodate the numbers.

"I remember walking with my brother (Bob) in the cold to the Coliseum," recalled Jack Lindenschmidt, an Evansville native born in 1929. "It seemed like a long way - we lived on North Fifth Avenue. At the party you got an orange and a little box with hard candies and chocolate drops. The years we went (during the mid-30s) we always hoped to get a box that had a lot of chocolate drops - of course we liked those best."

Reporter Walter Wunderlich earned the title "Courier Santa Claus" with his appearances at the parties for 25 years. As the decades unfolded, gifts and contributions arrived yearly from across the nation - some from adults who had been guests at the parties when they were children.

World War II brought high-paying jobs and a high employment rate to the Evansville area. Because relative prosperity replaced widespread poverty of the preceding years, The Courier gave its last Christmas party in 1942.