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Slim Chance Celebrants Want A Thin Santa

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By ROBERT KELLY-GOSS Cox News Service

Published: December 24, 2007

ELIZABETH CITY, N.C. - A skinny, fit-looking Santa? Is that what you want?

Perhaps, if you're U.S. Surgeon General Rear Adm. Steven Galson.

"It is really important that the people who kids look up to as role models are in good shape, eating well and getting exercise. It is absolutely critical," Galson said of Jolly Old St. Nick at a Boston gathering recently.

That's right, the surgeon general wants Santa Claus to cut back on the cookies and get in shape. Kids might get the wrong message, he says.

When Galson's clarion call for the jolly old elf's waistline to trim down hit newspapers and Web sites across North America, the critics came calling. It seems no one wants to see Santa change his image, at least not now.

Funny thing is, Santa's image has been a changing, evolving one for centuries.

Santa started out life as a fourth century Christian bishop in what is now Turkey. He was known for his love of children and benevolence to the needy and eventually became St. Nicholas.

The date of Nicholas' death was Dec. 6, and it quickly became a day of celebration. Children would set out food for the saint and in the morning find it gone, replaced with gifts.

His legend spread throughout Europe, and various languages called him by different names.

The Dutch called him Sinterklaas, which means St. Nicholas, and brought that name with them when they settled in North America.

In the English-speaking world of America, Sinterklaas eventually morphed into Santy Claus and then Santa Claus.

The vision of him as a jolly old elf with a round belly was given to us by Clement Moore's "'Twas the Night Before Christmas" in 1822. A little later, the first image that we might recognize today - a round old man with white whiskers - was created by illustrator Thomas Nast.

The image most closely associated with Santa today came in the 1930s from a Coca-Cola advertising campaign.

An older, larger man in a red suit with long white whiskers, painted by artist Haddon Sundblom, became the ubiquitous iconic vision of the old elf himself.

But now, in a world where children are practically eating themselves to death, some people want Santa to change that image, slim down and get into shape.

"I don't see where it would hurt anything," says James "Santa" Jenkins.

Jenkins is one of Santa's helpers. You know, kids can have their photo taken with him at the mall.

He is a retired schoolteacher with his own set of whiskers - tug on them and he'll say, "Ouch" - and he lost 65 pounds during the past year.

"I've had kids say, 'You're awful thin,' and I said my doctor likes it that way," Jenkins says.

Jenkins is actually a very jolly man who is easily identified as Santa Claus.

And he cares about children enough to know that it's OK to ask Santa to shed the pounds.

"Americans have a weight problem," Jenkins says.

Jenkins also heard about a recent fray over the "ho, ho, ho" issue in Australia. Folks Down Under are concerned that because "ho" is negative street slang, some people might be offended.

Jenkins has an answer for that as well. He has never uttered a "ho, ho, ho."

"I read where loud noises tend to scare kids," says the former educator, who doesn't want to spook the children.

"I try to work on their level. I say, 'Give me five.'"

And it seems to work, the entire package.

Jenkins' Santa is a pretty jolly figure, and he seems to be well-received by the kids.

"I feel guilty being paid for this," he says, with a grin and twinkle in his eye.

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