It’s a centuries-old tradition that risks being pushed aside by modern alternatives like email or even video messaging.
But a retiree who has unearthed her own handwritten letter to Santa written in 1952 said yesterday how it has evoked memories of a “different time” when even a bag of sweets was a longed-for gift.
Deirdre Quemby, 76, discovered the letter she wrote at the age of six in a box of her late mother’s belongings that she decided to sort through in the run-up to the festive period.
The charming letter, extensively misspelled, is written in pencil and contains a hopeful plea for “sweets” to be sent to her, a rare commodity in 1952, when the UK was still grappling with post-war food rationing.
Miss Quemby writes that she wants a ‘Mackey Mouse’ book, that is, the Disney character Mickey, a china tea set ‘like mammy got’, a dressing gown and a bottle of ‘sent’ for her mother Olive, a ‘ hakeakafe’, which means handkerchief – for nanny, and a book for ‘granny’.
He says goodbye sending affection to ‘Santer’ and adds numerous kisses.
Miss Quemby, a former comedian who is about to turn 60 as a dance teacher, said she would have written the letter when the family lived in her grandfather’s pub in Shepshed, Leicestershire.
His mother and father, Leonard, a former soldier working at an engineering company, later moved to the village of Mountsorrel, where his late mother worked at the local Rolls-Royce factory. Miss Quemby still lives today in the village just outside Leicester.
“I don’t remember writing the letter, but finding it has brought back wonderful memories,” she said.
‘I can still see the fire in the sitting room at the front of the pub where we spent most of our time. My grandfather used to keep a bottle of horse liniment by the fire to keep it warm. Every time we had discomfort or pain, they would rub it on us.
I can see the 9-inch black and white TV and the big leather sofa.
‘Getting sweets was a big problem back then. We still had rations. I remember the ration book.
