“Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree” isn’t just a playful song, it recalls a cultural memory of the antebellum South… A dark Christmas Eve tradition of forcing slaves to stand around a decorated evergreen while the white enslavers children hurled stones at them
The first child to record a kill received an extra present under the tree on Christmas morning
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This is the real Jingle Bell.
Many Africans celebrate it during Christmas, often singing the popular song Jingle Bells.
However, history tells a painful story: these bells were once placed on African ancestors to prevent their escape. If anyone tried to flee during the night,
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Readers added context
The song "Jingle Bells," written in 1857 by James Lord Pierpont as "One Horse Open Sleigh," celebrates sleigh bells on horse-drawn sleighs during winter festivities in Massachusetts and has no connection to bells used on enslaved Africans to prevent escape.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jingle_Be…
history.com/news/8-things-…
bu.edu/articles/2016/…