Hanukkah (also spelled Hanuka, Chanuka, Channuka, etc.) begins at sundown on December 19.

Anne Frank, who celebrated Hanukkah in the attic of a house in Amsterdam, wrote in her now famous diary for Dec. 7, 1942: "We just gave each other a few little presents and then we lit the candles. Because of the shortage of candles, we only had them alight for ten minutes."

Carol Bell Ford ("Nice Jewish Girls Growing Up in Brownsville, 1930s - 1950s") wrote, "Chanukah was not yet competing with Christmas. It was celebrated modestly. I remember receiving Chanukah gelt, usually fifty cents, but sometimes a silver dollar, from my father. 'Here's a shekel,' he would say (long before the state of Israel re-appropriated the biblical term for its currency)."

According to Jane Ulman, the custom of giving Chanukah gelt can be traced to 18th century Eastern Europe, and maybe earlier. For many, gelt was traditionally distributed on the fifth night of Chanukah, and many sources claim it rewarded children for studying Torah.

Gift giving at Chanukah should not be about money. We should make every effort to stay within a "budzhet" (budget). Accumulating "Detsember khoyv" (December debt) is a bad way to end "dos yor." It leads to "Yanuar boykhveytik" (January indigestion). And remember the expression, "Der rekhening iz do, ober dos gelt iz nito." (The bill is here but the money is not.)

Shown below is a chronology of Hanukkah trivia and holiday costs from 1842 to 2003.

1842
Historians report that the pages of The New York Times did not contain a single example of advertising with a Hanukkah/Christmas theme.

1870
December had become the merchant's single largest selling month of the year.

1870s
Macy's (NY) often required its clerks to work into the early morning during the hectic holiday rush. Some spent the remainder of short nights asleep on sales counters, using bolts of cloth for pillows. "freg nit." (Don't ask. You don't want to know how bad it is.)

1894
Bloomingdale's--no "shlock joint"--took out a full-page ad to announce that it would stay open late for holiday shoppers.

1912
Tate-mameh photographed the kinder with an Eastman Kodak Brownie box camera (der prayz: $1 - $4) or a folding Brownie ($5 - $12). Let's see a "shmaychl" (smile).

1913
Erector sets were very popular and sold for $.50 for the "No. 0" set, all the way up to $25,000 for the "No. 8" set.

1925
Heading "di reshime" (the list) of popular gifts with "Noo Yawkahs" were fancyschmancy hats, ascot mufflers, and radiator ornaments.

1930s
Betty Boop dolls and toys are very popular.

1932
A sled (for "di kelt vinter") sells for $3.95; mechanical toys, 3 for $.59.

1938
Kids spent Hanukkah building houses, buying railroads, renting property, etc. with the White Box Edition of Monopoly. (der prayz: $1.69 from the Sears Roebuck "Kah-tah-lawg).

1942
A holiday subscription to Life "zhurnal" (magazine) was $3.65.

1944
The be-all-and-end-all gift was a Frank Sinatra "plate" (record), 78, of course.

1955
The book, "Marjorie Morningstar" by Herman Wouk is a popular holiday gift.

1958
The cost of mailing a holiday card increased from 3 cents to 4 cents an oz.

The Hula Hoop, which sold for $1.98 in the "zumer," was marked down to "fufsik" cents by Hanukkah as the craze was fading. It was "billik vi borsht"-- cheap as borscht.

1960
The Neiman Marcus catalog sold the first "His and Hers" gifts-- pair of Beechcraft Bonanza airplanes. HIS: $149,000; HERS: $127,000. "Gay rekhen." (Go figure it out.)

1965
Women's coats at Best & Co. sell for $60.

1968
Shoppers searched the store for "fus" (foot) warmers, self-winding watches, and peace symbols fashioned from any and every medium.

1975
Franklin Simon sells women's raincoats for $34.49; men's shoes sell for $21.90 at Wallach's.

1977
A Liz Claiborne Cosmetics Survey of women' holiday shoppers indicates that 77% prefer shopping "aleyn"(alone), and 23% prefer shopping with someone else.

1978
The average price of a box of holiday cards was $2.71.

1980
A Gucci catalog offered a lizard handbag with an eighteen karat-gold detachable handle--which can be worn as a necklace for $11,500. "Mein hartz gayt oys." (I'm dying for it.)

1981
Neiman Marcus sells a His and Hers "goilem" (robot) for $15,000.

1983
Cabbage Patch doll sales were estimated at one "bilyon" dollars. Coleco chartered jets to fly more from the Orient. The late Jackie Kennedy came up short when an aide phoned FAO Schwarz in NYC and asked for one. "Me zol nit visn fun azoyne tsores." (We shouldn't know about such troubles.)

1986
A popular holiday gift in NYC was a "tsvelf dolar" ($12) deck of Leona Helmsley playing cards.

1988
Saks Fifth Avenue translators help customers shop in 9 foreign languages. "Red su mir Yidish." (Speak Yiddish to me.)

FAO Schwarz sells a $14,500 mini Ferrari and an $800 rocking horse. "Az men hot di matbaieh, hot men di daieh." (Money makes the world go round. If you can pay, you have the say.)

1990
Harry Lipsig, personal-injury specialist, sent 60,000 holiday cards to everyone he had ever "buttonholed" during his last "zekhtsik" (60) years of city practice.

1991
A two-oz. bottle of Recession, a cologne, sold for $22.50 at Bloomingdale's.

Molly Katz ("Jewish As A Second Language") wrote about Wrapping Paper:
"Gifts are opened carefully, using a pencil to lift the tape, so the paper can be saved. It isn't reused; that would be cheap. But it's a crime to throw away such lovely paper."

1995
Macy's reduced the percentage of commission for sales representatives during the five-week holiday selling season, cutting deeply into the biggest paychecks many employees receive all year.

1996
Theatergoers pay $100 to see the B'way show, Chicago. Big Onion Tours conducted its fifth annual Christmas Day walking tour of Jewish history on the Lower East Side.

1997
Psychotherapist, Janet Daman, continues to treat people who face the problem of binge buying. "Az a nar gait in mark, fraien zich di kremer." (When a fool goes shopping, the storekeepers rejoice.)

Casual business clothing is a popular holiday gift, as well as Dilbert books, posters, mugs, and boxers.

For the "kinder," happiness is a cyberpet named "Tomagotchi" and Sing & "khropen" (Snore) Ernie.

Joshua Halberstam ("Schmoozing") wrote about the elevation of Chanukah from the relatively minor holiday it was in Europe to the major Jewish holiday it is in the U. S. today. "The Talmud devoted a scant two pages to Chanukah while dedicating an entire volume to Purim," said Halberstam.

1999
Harry Potter books are a favorite, as well as Millennium/Y2K items.

To capture that Hanukkah Kodak Moment, the Millennium DC215, pocket-size digital camera in matte gold with 2000 embossed on it, sells for $499.

2000
The Conference Board expects that per-household holiday spending will be approximately $490.

Ari L. Goldman ("Being Jewish"), wrote, "Gift-giving doesn't have to mean following the throngs at the mall looking for the latest gismo...Some families set aside one night when the youngsters forgo their presents for the night and donate them to children at a homeless shelter."

Tickets to "Grine Felder" (Green Fields) at the Mazer Theater on the Lower East Side range from $18 to $30.

2001
J. Levine Judaica sells a Chanukah Fiddler on the Roof Menorah for $85, a Chanukah at Bubbe's--a video--for $29.95. Anymenorah.com expects to sell about 1,000 menorahs this year.

2002
Jewish Web sites state the No. 1 reason why Hanukkah is better than Christmas:
1. Blintzes are cheaper to mail than fruitcakes.

2003
Gift certificates for an introductory tandem lesson on a hang glider, paraglider over the beautiful San Francisco Bay in Northern California costs $285 each. "Goyisher nokhes"-- Pleasure from doing something traditionally un-Jewish, like hang gliding, or auto racing, or entering a beer drinking contest.
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Marjorie Gottieb Wolfe believes that the best holiday gift is the presence of a happy family all wrapped up with one another.

Her favorite Hanukkah story:
Twelve-year-old Sidney labored for many days to build a chair for his father, and finally, on Chanukah, he presented it as a gift. But when the boy's father sat on the chair, he found that the seat was far too high. Sidney said, "Halevay volt es yo geven, vi mir hobn gehoft." (I wish it had turned out the way we had hoped.) I made the chair too high!" "No, you didn't," said his father gently. "It's just that the table is too low."

Look for her soon-to-be-published book titled, "Are Yentas, Kibitzers, & Tummlers Weapons of Mass Instruction? - Yiddish Trivia."