Dancing Dan's Christmas

by Damon Runyon

First published in the December 21, 1932, issue of Collier's Weekly.

Genres: Christmas, Short Stories, Humor, Fiction, Mystery

Hardcover

First published December 21, 1932

About the author

Such volumes as Guys and Dolls (1931), the basis for a musical of the same name on Broadway, collect stories of known American writer Alfred Damon Runyon about the underworld of New York.

A family in Manhattan, Kansas, reared this newspaperman. His grandfather, a printer from New Jersey, relocated to Manhattan, Kansas in 1855, and his father edited his own newspaper in the town. In 1882, people forced father of Runyon forced to sell his newspaper, and the family moved westward. The family eventually settled in 1887 in Pueblo, Colorado, where Runyon spent the rest of his youth. He began to work in the newspaper trade under his father in Pueblo. People named a field, the repertory theater company, and a lake in his honor. He worked for various newspapers in the area of the Rocky Mountains and let stand a change in the spelling of his last name from "Runyan" to "Runyon."

In 1898, Runyon enlisted in the Army to fight in the Spanish-American War. The service assigned himto write for the Manila Freedom and Soldier's Letter.

He was best known for his short stories celebrating the world of Broadway in New York City that grew out of the Prohibition era. To New Yorkers of his generation, a "Damon Runyon character" evoked a distinctive social type from the Brooklyn or Midtown demi-monde. The adjective "Runyonesque" refers to this type of character as well as to the type of situations and dialog that Runyon depicted. He spun humorous tales of gamblers, hustlers, actors, and gangsters, few of whom go by "square" names, preferring instead colorful monikers such as "Nathan Detroit," "Benny Southstreet," "Big Jule," "Harry the Horse," "Good Time Charley," "Dave the Dude," or "The Seldom Seen Kid." Runyon wrote these stories in a distinctive vernacular style: a mixture of formal speech and colorful slang, almost always in present tense, and always devoid of contractions.

Runyon was also a newspaperman. He wrote the lead article for UP on Franklin Delano Roosevelt's Presidential inauguration in 1933.

Runyon died in New York City from throat cancer in late 1946, at age 66. His body was cremated, and his ashes were scattered from an airplane over Broadway in Manhattan by Captain Eddie Rickenbacker on December 18, 1946. The family plot of Damon Runyon is located at Woodlawn Cemetery in Bronx, NY. After Runyon's death, his friend and fellow journalist, Walter Winchell, went on his radio program and appealed for contributions to help fight cancer, eventually establishing the “Damon Runyon Cancer Memorial Fund” to support scientific research into causes of, and prevention of cancer.

Reviews

[Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽ · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.33 stars for this amusing 1932 Christmas story by Damon Runyon, who wrote the short stories that the musical Guys and Dolls is based on.



This story is set in the same Prohibition-era world, where the guys are gangsters and/or hard drinkers and the women are all "dolls." It's free online here at the New York Times magazine.

The narrator is hanging out at Good Time Charley's New York speakeasy, drinking rather too many hot Tom and Jerry's with Charley, when a guy called Dancin' Dan shows up to join them in their Christmas Eve drinking binge. When another guy nicknamed Ooky shows up a couple of hours later, dressed in a Santa Claus outfit from his job, Dancin' Dan has a great idea: borrow Ooky's Santa Claus suit and go bring Christmas to a destitute 90 year old lady, the grandmother of one Miss Muriel O'Neill who Dan has been dancing with lately at her club.

"... I wish to say I always question his judgment in dancing so much with Miss Muriel O'Neill, who works in the Half Moon Night Club. And the reason I question his judgment in this respect is because everybody knows that Miss Muriel O'Neill is a doll who is very well thought of by Heine Schmitz, and Heine Schnitz is not such a guy as will take kindly to anybody dancing more than once and a half with a doll that he thinks well of."

At any rate, everyone is buzzed enough to think that sneaking into Miss Muriel's apartment to fill the stocking of her grandmamma is a grand idea. So off go the three guys on their errand of Christmas charity and cheer.

There are some really fun twists to this rather O. Henry-like tale. There's also a little too much 30's-style slang, and you have to be able to handwave the outdated social attitudes in this 80+ year old story. But otherwise it's a quite funny and goodhearted Christmas tale.

December 2018 group read with the Retro Reads group.

[H (trying to keep up with GR friends) Balikov · Rating 4 out of 5]

Damon Runyon’s writing focuses on the New York City of the second decade of the 20th century - a time of Prohibition, crime and, for him, plenty of opportunities for drama. This tale bears some resemblance to his literary forebear, O. Henry.

Runyon carves out a territory that focuses on the idiosyncrasies of NYC’s demi-monde. Our tale is related by Broadway, a guy who attempts to find the path of least resistance in the conflicts among the “guys and dolls” with whom he interacts. Some of the guys are known by their colorful nicknames that, here and in other stories, include: Harry the Horse, Earthquake, Benny Southstreet, Goodtime Charlie, Dave the Dude, Nathan Detroit, Big Jule, Dancing Dan and Broadway.

This story opens on Christmas Eve at Goodtime Charlie’s speakeasy (and illegal pub during Prohibition). It features consumption of Goodtime Charlie’s enormous supply of the concoction known as a Tom and Jerry (a real winter warmer that goes back at least 100 years from when this story takes place.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_and...

Broadway and Charlie proceed to “knock back” a few before Dancing Dan (a light-footed burglar) joins them. The story proceeds with Dan wanting to please his current love interest, “Miss Muriel O'Neill, who works in the Half Moon Night Club. And … (whom) everybody knows … is a doll who is very well thought of by Heine Schmitz, and Heine Schnitz is not such a guy as will take kindly to anybody dancing more than once and a half with a doll that he thinks well of.”

Miss Muriel has a grandmother who still believes in Santa Claus even though her stocking (hung up with care every year) has remained unfilled.

Again, the elements:
 Holiday inebriation
 Christmas Eve
 The threat of violence
 Belief in Santa, and
 Love, or its close sibling

Are mixed together in a satisfying way, deserving 4*

[Kaethe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Runyon's a charming writer, in part because he seems to be so sympathetic to the concerns of his characters. And his language is fun and inventive. This is one of the stories mentioned in the intro to A Lot Like Christmas

Available online https://familychristmasonline.com/sto...

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Completely forgot to review this. Cute little Christmas story. Cute, in a way. You gotta wonder, did Dancin Dan know about his welcome committee, or was it dumb luck/a Christmas miracle? 4 solid stars.

[ꕥ Ange_Lives_To_Read ꕥ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Christmas 2018 - NICE!

Amusing Guys and Dolls-era short story with a good little twist at the end

[Kenneth Green · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very funny short read. One of the books recommended by Connie Willis in her Christmas short story collection (Miracle ...)

[Anna · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not for me, though nothing really against it. It was all just men.

[Rose · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 ⭐️

[Camilla]

A mishap Christmas Eve short story about three men having several too many in a speakeasy, then deciding to play Santa as a good deed. It’s got that old-timey gimmicky feel that some early musicals have. Runyon writes only in the present tense, which was an interesting choice when he was telling past tense events. I found it amusing!

[Meg · Rating 2 out of 5]

A story about a drunken Christmas Eve where a group of men drink to excess, dress up as Santa and deposit “gifts” in an old woman’s Christmas stocking. It turns out that the gifts were stolen diamonds and the thief escaped out of town. Not the best.

[Jan Z · Rating 4 out of 5]

A mobster Christmas tale with gangsters, dolls ( women), an old lady, and a Santa Claus suit.
13 pgs

[Kt · Rating 5 out of 5]

charming

[Anita · Rating 5 out of 5]

This witty little short story tells about how a good deed prevented a bad deed. I enjoyed the language and the first-person narrative. I recommend this book.