A Pictorial History of Santa Claus

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1906

In this Canadian department store brochure from 1906 we see that Santa, with his black trimmed suit and bobble-less hat, was still able to deviate from his typical image.

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1913

The illustrator Norman Rockwell, with his many depictions throughout the 1920s, was a key player in cementing Santa’s modern look. Here is an early illustration of his from before the First World War.

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1914

An Japanese illustration from 1914, showing the spread of the Santa legend had reached far wider than just Europe and America.

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1918

Santa appears in classic form in this piece of U.S. WW1 propaganda.

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1920

Pictured here are just two of Norman Rockwell’s many Santa themed covers for the Saturday Evening Post. Like Sundblom’s depictions for Coca Cola more than a decade later, these pictures of Rockwell’s give a very physiologically human and naturalistic aspect to the character as opposed to the more cartoonish features which had gone before.

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1930

Santa in Australia in 1930.

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1942

In the U.S. Second World War poster below Santa takes a radical departure from the jolly red suit and dons the dour shades of war.

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