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Christmas each year brings a whole range of songs, both traditional and modern, associated with the holiday. They spark our memories and brighten our festivity. One song we hear every year has its roots right here in Honesdale, Pa.: Winter Wonderland.
The author was Dick Smith, born in 1901 in Honesdale and raised at 922 Church Street, opposite the park. His sister Marjorie, who lived to the age of 97, maintained to this writer and to others that her famous brother was inspired by the snow in Honesdale’s Central Park. No doubt, like multitudes of children through the town’s history, Smith built his share of snowmen there.
As the song declares, a snowman is proposed to be named Parson Brown, to marry the two lovers.
Smith penned the song in 1934, collaborating with song writer Felix Bernard, a year before Smith died of tuberculosis. Smith contracted he disease four years before, eventually claiming the gifted lyricist at the age of 33. Winter Wonderland was his most well known song, but one of several that he wrote and were published.
The song was an immediate hit, being featured in its first year as the opening song at the Christmas show at Radio City Music Hall. It was used by Guy Lombardo with the Royal Canadians in the Ziegfields Follies.
According to starplus.com, Winter Wonderland has topped the list of 10 most played Christmas tunes on American radio since 2002. It was the second most played song in 2007, behind Sleigh Ride.
Songwriter Felix Bernard is also best known for Winter Wonderland, and lived,1897-1944, only a few years longer than Smith. Neither he nor Smith lived to see the grand success of their pinnacle song. It was not until 1946 that Perry Como and the Andrew Sisters both made hugely popular recordings of the song which catapulted it to the status of a Christmas classic.
Here are the lyrics:
Winter Wonderland
(Felix Bernard/Dick Smith)
Sleigh bells ring
Are you listening
In the lane
Snow is glistening
A beautiful sight
We're happy tonight
Walking in a winter wonderland
Gone away is the bluebird
Here to stay is a new bird
He sings a love song
As we go along
Walking in a winter wonderland
In the meadow we can build a snowman
Then pretend he is Parson Brown
He'll say: Are you married?
We'll say: No man
But you can do the job
When you're in town
Later on
We'll conspire
As we dream by the fire
To face unafraid
The plans that we've made
Walking in a winter wonderland
Winter wonderland
In the meadow we can build a snowman
And pretend that he's a circus clown
We'll have lots of fun with mister snowman
Until the other kiddies knock him down
When it snows
Ain't it thrilling
Though your nose gets a chilling
We'll frolic and play
The Eskimo way
Walking in a winter wonderland
Yeah we're walking in a winter
Yeah we're walking in a winter
We're walking in a winter wonderland
Wonderland
Winter wonderland!
Christmas each year brings a whole range of songs, both traditional and modern, associated with the holiday. They spark our memories and brighten our festivity. One song we hear every year has its roots right here in Honesdale, Pa.: Winter Wonderland.
The author was Dick Smith, born in 1901 in Honesdale and raised at 922 Church Street, opposite the park. His sister Marjorie, who lived to the age of 97, maintained to this writer and to others that her famous brother was inspired by the snow in Honesdale’s Central Park. No doubt, like multitudes of children through the town’s history, Smith built his share of snowmen there.
As the song declares, a snowman is proposed to be named Parson Brown, to marry the two lovers.
Smith penned the song in 1934, collaborating with song writer Felix Bernard, a year before Smith died of tuberculosis. Smith contracted he disease four years before, eventually claiming the gifted lyricist at the age of 33. Winter Wonderland was his most well known song, but one of several that he wrote and were published.
The song was an immediate hit, being featured in its first year as the opening song at the Christmas show at Radio City Music Hall. It was used by Guy Lombardo with the Royal Canadians in the Ziegfields Follies.
According to starplus.com, Winter Wonderland has topped the list of 10 most played Christmas tunes on American radio since 2002. It was the second most played song in 2007, behind Sleigh Ride.
Songwriter Felix Bernard is also best known for Winter Wonderland, and lived,1897-1944, only a few years longer than Smith. Neither he nor Smith lived to see the grand success of their pinnacle song. It was not until 1946 that Perry Como and the Andrew Sisters both made hugely popular recordings of the song which catapulted it to the status of a Christmas classic.
Here are the lyrics:
Winter Wonderland
(Felix Bernard/Dick Smith)
Sleigh bells ring
Are you listening
In the lane
Snow is glistening
A beautiful sight
We're happy tonight
Walking in a winter wonderland
Gone away is the bluebird
Here to stay is a new bird
He sings a love song
As we go along
Walking in a winter wonderland
In the meadow we can build a snowman
Then pretend he is Parson Brown
He'll say: Are you married?
We'll say: No man
But you can do the job
When you're in town
Later on
We'll conspire
As we dream by the fire
To face unafraid
The plans that we've made
Walking in a winter wonderland
Winter wonderland
In the meadow we can build a snowman
And pretend that he's a circus clown
We'll have lots of fun with mister snowman
Until the other kiddies knock him down
When it snows
Ain't it thrilling
Though your nose gets a chilling
We'll frolic and play
The Eskimo way
Walking in a winter wonderland
Yeah we're walking in a winter
Yeah we're walking in a winter
We're walking in a winter wonderland
Wonderland
Winter wonderland!
