1 December is when many people open the first door on their Advent calendar. These are so common that few people realise it is a relatively modern tradition. This is the story …
Origins
The precursor to the Advent calendar originated in 19th-century German Lutheran homes as a method of counting down the days up to Christmas. It gradually developed into the printed, windowed calendars of today.
In the 1800s, German Lutherans often marked the approach of Christmas with small daily rituals such as drawing chalk lines on doors. By the late 19th century there are reports of handmade Advent calendars, which were boards or sheets with devotional images hung upon them. One of the earliest known examples of a wooden Advent calendar dates from about 1851.
Printed calendars
The first modern commercially printed Advent calendar is credited to Gerhard Lang (1881-1974), a German publisher based in Munich in Bavaria. His father had been a Swabian Lutheran priest, and he was inspired by his mother’s childhood practice of attaching treats or pictures to a piece of card in the run up to Christmas.
In 1903 he printed a “Weihnachts- Kalendar” (Christmas calendar) called “Im Lande des Christkinds” (in the land of the Christ-child) with 24 images which you could put a sticker on. Different variants came out each year.
Some of these started on December 6, which is Sankt Nikolaus Tag (St Nicholas’s Day) and was considered the start of Christmas in the German tradition, and they had biblical and religious imagery. In 1920, he added little doors or windows for each day, which when opened revealed an image and sometimes a Bible text. Other publishers soon imitated and expanded this format.
Development
These commercial Adventskalender (Advent calendars) ran from the first of December through to Christmas Eve (1–24 December) regardless of the liturgical Advent. This made them re-usable year after year. By not starting on Advent Sunday the publisher did not have to change the numbers every year.From the 1920s many more publishers were producing Advent calendars in Germany, and some publishers started to produce more secular style calendars with pictures of toys and gifts. In the 1930s the idea spread to Austria, Italy and Scandinavia and some German printers started to export them.
In 1945 the German publisher Richard Sellmer of Stuttgart started to produce Advent calendars with traditional Swabian folk scenes. He produced these in German, but also in English because Stuttgart was in the American zone of occupation, and some were bought by American servicemen and sent home.
Advent calendars in the USA
In 1953 a German Advent calendar was presented to American President Eisenhower, which showed a depiction of a peaceful quaint Swabian town. A photograph was published in the American media showing him sitting with his grandchildren opening an Advent calendar. They then started to become popular in the USA.
Advent calendars in the UK
Meanwhile in the UK, references to Advent calendars noted them as a distinctively German or Scandinavian tradition. They might be seen in the homes of people with German or Scandinavian heritage, or some people might have them as gifts from friends in Europe. Some Protestant Advent calendars were imported from Germany and Denmark, and Catholic ones from Italy. They were seen as novelty religious items sold alongside crib scenes, and Christmas cards in Christian bookstores and cathedral shops.Advent calendars first came into shops in the British high street in November 1956, selling for two shillings each. An advertisement in the Bucks Examiner explained “there is a special children's ‘Advent calendar’ on sale in the shops which helps to pass the time until Christmas Eve by revealing a new picture for each day in December. This calendar, which is already extremely popular on the continent, appears in England for the first time this festive season.”
Another advertisement in the Leicester Evening Mail explained: “From the continent comes an unusual calendar for Christmas, especially for children — the Advent calendar. It is a brightly coloured picture with sections semi-cut, each bearing a number from one to 24. These open like a little door. Behind each door is a different picture. Beginning on December 1 the child opens door number one, on December 2 door number two, and so up to the last and largest door, number 24 which, when opened on Christmas Eve, reveals the Nativity scene.” Then from 1959 the British Polio Fellowship produced the first charity Advent calendar, which they continued until 1967. The 1960s saw the development of the commercial market for Advent calendars designed and printed in the UK. In 1966 an advertiser wrote “Shops now sell Advent calendars, a novel idea from the Continent. A small ‘door’ for each day of Advent opens and reveals pictures symbolising Christmas. They are fascinating for children and cost from two shillings each.”
Modern Advent calendars
It was in 1971, that Cadbury's first launched a chocolate Advent calendar in the UK. It was then not until the 1990s, that novelty Advent calendars, often with little or no religious content, really took off. Today Advent calendars are used across Christian traditions and also in largely secular settings. They function as a commercial countdown and, in more traditional forms, as a way of teaching the elements of the Christmas story.
