The origin of the lyric "scary ghost stories"?

How might the New York City-born Jewish songwriters of “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” Edward Pola (Sidney Edward Pollacsek) (1907-1995) and George Wyle (Bernard Weissman) (1916-2003) have been exposed to the tradition “of scary ghost stories and tales of the glories of Christmases long, long ago?”

Both men appear to have been living in California in the early 1960s. Some searching on ancestry.com indicated that the former’s father Alexander Pollacsek was from Hungary; the latter’s, David Bernard Weissman, was from Romania.

Had the writers learned traditions from Christian friends and neighbors in the US? Were they familiar in some way via their ancestors in Europe, given that Hungary and Romania had some ghostly Christmas traditions involving witches or goat-men?

Those things are possible, but credit might go primarily to Edward Pola, who spent much of his life in England between 1926 and 1961 at least, if not longer. Contributions to and mentions of the tradition hadn't ended with WWI, though they appear to have been somewhat less frequent.

Even someone who had not spent time in England could have been aware of the tradition, however. As I’d noted in the introduction to the Valancourt Book of Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories volume four, aside from British publications being sold in America also, and Americans republishing British stories, some Americans wrote stories in the tradition as well. The anthologist Edward Wagenknecht, writing in 1949, thought that American examples were “few and far between,” but he couldn’t have dreamed of the search tools we have today. August Derleth, more grounded in horror literature than Wagenknecht was, showed more awareness, writing under the headline “U.S. Revives Ghost Tales for Holidays” in 1945 that there was

“abundant evidence that the American reader is finding a great deal of pleasure in this form of entertainment. […] The telling of those stories at Christmas Eve as well as at Halloween is a time-honored tradition in America as well as in European countries, if admittedly not as wide-spread as it is across the sea.”
Derleth, August. “U.S. Revives Ghost Tales for Holidays.” Chicago Tribune. December 2, 1945: 20 col 5.

It’s hard to know what publications Pola and Wyle might have been reading in California in the 1960s. American newspapers did sometimes refer to the tradition, but seemingly less often than in the nineteenth century.

There doesn’t appear to be any evidence that listeners found the “scary ghost stories” lyric strange in 1963 or for decades following, despite the multitude of newspapers existing at the time, letters to the editor, syndicated humor columns, Q&A columns, etc. Still, it’s possible there were people that wondered about it and didn’t publicly pursue an answer, or that they supposed that Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” alone satisfactorily accounted for it and didn't look any further.

It’s also possible that Pola and Wyle’s parents would have been exposed to the traditions in Jewish publications in New York City in the late 19th-century. For example, in the the NY Jewish Messenger newspaper, “The Ghost at Beechover Hall” was reprinted from Once a Week’s Christmas 1866 issue, a story that included the line “The only thing which gave this ghost any individuality was, that, though her silks were often heard, she was only seen on Christmas-eve”. Some other New York examples follow, as well as an instance from a London paper reporting on a Rabbi reciting Dickens.

“Ethel will tell you the story. On former occasions the ghost has made its appearance or the voice has been heard, about Christmas time, so don’t be surprised if you hear a queer voice talking to you to-night—a weird elfin voice, complaining of its sad fate, and warning you of future ills.”
“A Mystery,” The Jewish Messenger [NY]. May 25, 1878: 1 col 3. (Reprinted from Munro, J[ohn]. “The Sphinx: A Mystery.” Cassell’s Family Magazine. Volume 4. April 1878. 275-279.)

“Sophie Strauss, I am not a bigot at all. I think Christmas is a lovely time for Christian children, and I love to read Dickens’ Christmas Carol. But for us—why we have Hanukkah.”
“For the Little Folks: Why Sophie Did Not Have a Christmas Tree.” Jewish Messenger [NY]. December 29, 1882: 5 col 1.

“The Christmas number of Illustrations is a splendid specimen of the art of the printer and engraver. Among its contents will be found the usual seasonable ghost story”
“Literary and Art Notes.” Jewish World [London]. December 13, 1889: 2 col 3.

“Dr. Adler, the Chief Rabbi, presided last Saturday night [January 15th] at the reading, given by Sir Squire Bancroft, of Dickens' ‘Christmas Carol’, at St. Martin's Town Hall, in aid of the Home and Hospital for Jewish Incurables.”
“East and West.” Jewish World [London]. January 21, 1898: 304 col 2.

Bancroft’s public reading did not occur without some issue. While complimenting Rabbi Adler, Bancroft, and Dickens, the same paper nonetheless noted in a separate item “we are compelled to think that the reading was not well selected. We have nothing but praise and thanks for Sir Squire Bancroft; we only regret that he was not asked to read something that could not raise the spirit of controversy, and that did not in any way jar upon Jewish tradition” (301 col 1.). In other contexts, though, than Jewish charitable fundraising, there’s evidence of it continuing to be read by some Jewish readers for its entertainment, as literature.

“Mr. [Albert Lewis] Kanter, whose Classics Illustrated has sold more than 40,000,000 copies of better comics dealing with subjects loftier than gangsters and hideous moon-men, reported recently on an inspection of the Israeli scene that small-fry in the young republic prefer the heavier stuff to trash. Tales like David Copperfield, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Ivanhoe — even Dickens’ Christmas Carol — highest on the Israeli lists.”
Shalom, Joseph. “Nuggets From Israel.” Southern Jewish Weekly [Jacksonville, FL]. June 4, 1954: 9.

Something else intriguing, Nittel Nacht, a relatively obscure, niche Jewish holiday; it may or may not have been known to Pola or Wyle:

“it is ‘possible the German Christian perception of Christmas Eve as a dangerous time given over to demons and ghosts had some influence on the atmosphere in the Jewish German community, where these practices we have been looking at were first attested.’ As we will see, this particular superstition had more than a passing influence on the atmosphere in the Jewish German community on Christmas Eve - this German Christian tradition was, in fact, an important (if indirect) source of the Jewish Nittel Nacht observances.”
Scharbach, Rebecca. “The Ghost in the Privy: On the Origins of Nittel Nacht and Modes of Cultural Exchange.” Jewish Studies Quarterly, vol. 20, no. 4, 2013, pp. 340–373., http://www.jstor.org/stable/24751806 . Accessed 18 Aug. 2020.

The above article also mentions Krampus and many of the other similar bugbears. A couple others on the subject:

Cohen, Benjamin. “The little-known Jewish holiday of Christmas Eve. Seriously.” Slate. December 22, 2009. https://slate.com/human-interest/2009/12/the-little-known-jewish-holiday-of-christmas-eve-seriously.html .

Alleson-Gerberg, Shai. "Nittel Nacht: An Inverted Christmas with Toledot Yeshu How Jews responded to the celebration of Jesus' birth by creating a cynical version of Christmas Eve lampooning him." TheTorah.com. n.d. https://www.thetorah.com/article/nittel-nacht-an-inverted-christmas-with-toledot-yeshu .

There had actually been a short story in that tradition in consideration for The Valancourt Book of Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories, volume four. It's still one I'd like to see anthologized, should there be another volume in the future.

It's also worth remembering that just as "fairy tales" don't necessarily feature a fairy, "ghost stories" don't necessarily involve a ghost. The term had historically been used even more loosely than now, and could be considered roughly like "weird tales" or "horror stories." Mary Shelley, for example, had described her Frankenstein as a "ghost story"; Robert Louis Stevenson's "The Body-Snatcher" was announced as a ghost story for Christmas:

"Mr. Stevenson has found a thrilling title for the ghost story which will appear in the Christmas number of the Pall Mall Gazette. It is to be called 'The Body Snatcher.' And it will be a thrilling story, I can tell you. Such a tale as will make your blood curdle like restaurant milk. But surely Mr. Stevenson's thriller would have been sufficient attraction without the addition of a twenty pound prize. Mr. Stead might have spared us this. The portrait of Miss Fortescue was bad enough, but surely the journal written by gentlemen for gentlemen can get along without such inducements to purchasers as money prizes."
Sporting Gazette. December 13, 1884: 10 col 3.

The term was used somewhat interchangeably with "goblin tale" or "goblin story":

"Changed as we are in manhood, still the established regulations of our Christmas homes hurry us back to what we were many years ago. The same preparations for happiness in the same old house, the same old faces, the round game at cards, the misletoe, the Christmas log, the goblin tale, and game at blind-man’s-buff, all equipotent in their magic influence to cheat us out of what we are, and make us young and innocent again"
“Christmas.” Windsor and Eton Express. December 22, 1849: 4 col 5.