Twas The Night Before Christmas by Clement Clarke Moore

The controversy is why so many people are still questioning the authenticity of something indisputably proven to be true.'

How this woman reacted to finding a letter she wrote to Santa 50 years ago.

Seth Kaller, an expert on authenticating historical documents, said the matter was in 'Obama birth certificate territory.' Responding to Foster's book, Stephen Nissenbaum, professor emeritus of history at the University of Massachusetts, wrote an article in defence of Moore back in 2001.

Not surprisingly, there are those who dispute the professors' and Van Deusen's take. Yet despite the support for Livingston's authorship, Van Deusen, who has created a densely detailed website about the issue, says it still makes her 'very, very sad that truth isn't easy to get out there.' The Moore camp one in 2013, which ended in a hung jury, and another the following year in which a jury ruled that Livingston was the real author.

The case has also sparked at least two jovial mock trials in Troy, N.Y.

(Bettmann Archive/Getty Images)Īdditionally, in 2000, forensic linguist and Vassar College English professor Donald Foster concluded in his book, Author Unknkown, that Livingston authored the poem. Moore is shown in a replica portrait originally painted by Daniel Huntington. 'The best evidence favouring Livingston is hard to explain away,' he wrote in an email to CBC News. It's a tough charge, but Van Duesen has some academic ammunition to back up her claim. Just last year, MacDonald Jackson, English professor emeritus at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, published his book Who Wrote The Night Before Christmas? Analyzing the Clement Clarke Moore vs. 'To me, it's just righting a wrong,' she said. 'I feel there's something fundamentally wrong with people stealing other people's work.' 'Twas the Night Before Christmas, but according to lore, This beloved poem was not written by Clement Clarke Moore.Īt least that's the opinion of Mary Van Deusen, who claims her great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, Henry Livingston Jr., a poet and farmer from a Poughkeepsie, N.Y., is the true author of the iconic holiday verse.įor years, Van Deusen has been doing her best to try to convince the public that her unheralded ancestor deserves credit for the legendary prose. Note: This article was originally published in 2017

Twas The Night Before Christmas by Clement Clarke Moore