In 1861 Tom Smith launched his new range of what he called ‘Bangs of Expectation’!

Legend says that, one night, while he was sitting in front of his log fire, he became very interested by the sparks and cracks coming from the fire. Suddenly, he thought what a fun idea it would be, if his sweets and toys could be opened with a crack when their fancy wrappers were pulled in half.

However, looking into the history of the Tom Smith company, it’s thought that Tom actually bought the recipe for the small cracks and bangs in crackers from a fireworks company called Brock’s Fireworks. The story of him sitting by the fire was probably added to help sell his new items.

Crackers were also nicknamed called ‘cosaques’ and were thought to be named after the ‘Cossack’ soldiers who had a reputation for riding on their horses and firing guns into the air.

When Tom died, his expanding cracker business was taken over by his three sons, Tom, Walter and Henry. Walter introduced the hats into crackers and he also traveled around the world looking for new ideas for gifts to put in the crackers. The crowns might have been inspired from Epiphany cakes from Europe which are often decorated with a paper crown on the top.

The company built up a big range of ‘themed’ crackers. There were ones for bachelors and spinsters (single men and women), where the gifts were things like false teeth and wedding rings! There were also crackers for Suffragettes (women who campaigned to get women the vote), war heroes and even Charlie Chaplain! Crackers were also made for special occasions like Coronations. The British Royal Family still has special crackers made for them today!

Very expensive crackers were made such as the ‘Millionaire’s Crackers’ which contained a solid silver box with a piece of gold and silver jewerly inside it!

Cracker manufacturers also made large displays, such as horse drawn carriages and sleighs, for the big shops in London.

The Christmas Crackers that are used today are short cardboard tubes wrapped in colorful paper. There is normally a Cracker next to each plate on the Christmas dinner table. When the crackers are pulled – with a bang! – a colorful party hat, a toy or gift and a festive joke falls out! The party hats look like crowns and it is thought that they symbolise the crowns that might have been worn by the Wise Men.

source: whychristmas.com

Egészítsd ki a Christmas Cracker-ekben található vicceket a megadott opciók alapján.
source: Christmas Jokes, whychristmas.com

useful information:

nickel –  (in the US and Canada) a coin worth five cents
soot –  a black powder composed mainly of carbon, produced when coal, wood, etc. is burned
to soothe – to make someone feel calm or less worried:
to wrap –  to cover or surround something with paper, cloth, or other material
platform shoes –  a style of shoe with a very thick high sole (= bottom part)
clue –  a sign or some information that helps you to find the answer to a problem, question, or mystery
crisp –  hard enough to be broken easily
Kris Kringle –  Santa Claus
source: Cambridge Dictionary

Christmas in India

Fill in the gaps with the following words to read about Indian Christmas customs.

Compared to other 1 ………………… festivals, Christmas is quite a small festival in India, due to the number of people who are Christians (about 2.3%) 2 ………………… people who belong to other religions. Having said this, the population of India is over 1 Billion, so there are 3 ………………… 25 million Christians in India!

4 ………………… mass is a very important service for Christians in India, especially Catholics. The whole family will walk to the mass and this will be followed by a massive 5 ………………… of different delicacies, (mostly curries) and the giving and receiving of presents. 6 ………………… in India are decorated with Poinsettia flowers and candles for the Christmas Eve Midnight Mass service.

In India, Father Christmas delivers presents to children from a horse and 7 …………………. Instead of having traditional Christmas trees, a 8 ………………… or mango tree is decorated (or whatever tree people can find to decorate). Sometimes people use mango leaves to decorate their homes. In Southern India, Christians often put small oil burning clay lamps on the 9 ………………… roofs of their homes to show their neighbours that Jesus is the light of the world.

Christians in Mumbai often display a manger 10 ………………… a front window and there’s great competition in making the nativity scene. Also families go to great lengths to hang giant paper lanterns, in the shape of stars, 11 ………………… the houses so that the stars float above you as you walk down the road. Every household also makes sure that they have a stock of 12 ………………… sweets ready for visitors.

source: www.whychristmas.com

answers: 1-g 2-j 3-c 4-f 5-a 6-l 7-k 8-b 9-e 10-d 11-h 12-i

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