The Legacy Of A Washingtonian And HIs Tie To 'White Christmas"

There are an estimated 50,000 plus Christmas songs in existence. Out of all of those offerings, may fall into relative obscurity, or resonate with a smaller portion of the holiday music loving population. The great ones get recorded a zillion times and you hear all one zillion versions leading up to Christmas.

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The Best Selling Single Belongs To Christmas

One of the most popular, most re-recorded, and biggest selling song (not just Christmas...all-time) can trace it's lineage to Washington State. While the man who wrote it was born in Russia before the Bolshevik Revolution, the man it is most closely associated with called Washington State his home.

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The only Christmas song that can fit that category is White Christmas. Written in 1940 by Irving Berlin, it was first heard in 1941 on the Christmas Day radio broadcast of NBC's Kraft Music Hall. It was also the first time Tacoma born and Spokane raised Bing Crosby would croon the song.

Crosby Was Already A Star, But...

Bing Crosby honed his talents in the Spokane area (he attended Gonzaga University but left without a degree) before heading to California in 1925. By the time White Christmas crossed his path, Crosby was a well established recording, radio, and movie star.

The song would make Bing one of the first global icons. His version alone is believed to have sold over 50 million copies worldwide (all other versions combined bring the total to around 100 million for the song itself), making it the best selling version of any song in history.

It's certainly a song you'll hear a lot around Spokane and other parts of Eastern Washington. The next time you hear it, know it was made timeless by arguably the most famous Washingtonian in history.

The Symbolism of the 12 Days of Christmas Explained

The Twelve Days of Christmas was originally published in England in the late eighteenth century. The best known version is a 1909 arrangement by English composer Frederic Austin. He said he simply put down on paper the song he remembered singing with his family as a child. Many of us have often wondered why the lords are a leaping and why we need to know about eight maids a milking. As with many things, the animals and people in the song are symbolic. In this case, they represent things found in the Bible.

Gallery Credit: Tasha Stevens