Santa Claus, Indiana: The Story of America's Christmas Hometown

Photo: The welcome sign in Santa Claus, Indiana by Drew Tarvin, licensed under CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

This week's Neighborhood of the Week has the most Christmas name in America. Santa Claus, Indiana is a small town in the southern part of the state, and it calls itself America's Christmas Hometown.

How It Got the Name

Nobody knows exactly. In the 1850s, the town applied for a post office under the name Santa Fe, but Indiana already had a Santa Fe, so it needed a new name. The Santa Claus post office opened on May 21, 1856.

The rest is legend. The version the town tells: on Christmas Eve, folks were gathered in a little log church trying to settle on a name when a gust of wind blew the doors open, sleigh bells drifted in, and the children ran to the door shouting "Santa Claus! Santa Claus!" Historians have found a few versions of the story, and at least one is embellished. It's still a good one.

Letters to Santa

With a name like that, the mail was bound to show up. Kids all over the country started writing to Santa in care of the Santa Claus post office, and in 1914, postmaster James Martin started writing back.

The tradition never stopped. Today a volunteer group called Santa's Elves answers thousands of letters a year from the town's original post office, now part of the Santa Claus Museum & Village. Stop in, write a letter, include your address, and Santa writes back in December.

The working post office gets slammed this time of year. It handles more than 400,000 pieces of mail in December, compared to about 13,000 a month the rest of the year. Since 1983, it has offered a special holiday picture postmark every Christmas season, designed by a local high school art student. Some people drive into town to mail their Christmas cards in person, and others request the postmark by mail.

A 22-Foot Santa

In 1935, Chicago businessman Carl Barrett unveiled a 22-foot Santa statue in town. It was billed as solid granite. It's actually concrete. It still stands at the Santa Claus Museum & Village, along with the original post office and a church from 1880.

Santa's Candy Castle went up the same year, the first tourist attraction in town. It's still there too.

Santa Claus Land

Image: Santa Claus statue at Santa Claus Land, a 1955 postcard from the Newberry Library's Curt Teich Postcard Archives, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Evansville industrialist Louis J. Koch noticed something about the families visiting Santa Claus: the kids were disappointed when they found out Santa wasn't actually there. So as a retirement project, he fixed that. Santa Claus Land opened on August 3, 1946, and it's often called the world's first theme park.

For 38 years, the park's resident Santa was Jim Yellig. In 1984, the park added Halloween and Fourth of July sections and changed its name to Holiday World. Today it's Holiday World & Splashin' Safari, still in Santa Claus.

Christmas Every Day

About 2,600 people lived in Santa Claus at the 2020 census, and most of them live in Christmas Lake Village, a community that got its start in the 1960s. The main streets are named for the three wise men, Melchior, Balthazar and Kaspar. Others are named for reindeer, like Prancer Drive and Vixen Lane. There's even a street called Chestnut by the Fire.

If You Go

This year, the live reindeer are in town November 28 and 29, chestnuts are roasting from November 28 through December 19, and the Santa Claus Christmas Parade rolls through town on Saturday, December 12, at 1 p.m. Central. In mid-December, Christmas Lake Village opens its gates for a drive-through Festival of Lights.

The town posts each year's postmark design and how to request it on its website, santaclausind.org.

Rep Santa Claus

Live in Santa Claus, grew up there, or just love it? Grab the Santa Claus Neighborhoodie. Nearby, we also make the Dale Neighborhoodie and the Ferdinand Neighborhoodie. Not your neighborhood? We make Neighborhoodies for more than 21,000 neighborhoods across the country, so find yours or browse more Indiana Neighborhoodies.

Know a neighborhood with a story we should tell? Email us at hi@704shop.com and it could be next.

Sources: Indiana Historical Bureau: Santa Claus, Indiana, a Land of Fantasy; SantaClausInd.org: The Story of Santa Claus, Indiana; SantaClausInd.org: Santa Claus Postmark; Santa Claus Museum & Village; Holiday World: Park History; American Name Society: Life Inside a Town Called Santa Claus, Indiana; Wikipedia: Santa Claus, Indiana; SantaClausInd.org: Events