Maureen and her Christmas Cracker Gifts to our Mahjong Group

My Christmas and Birthday Gifts this Year, featuring Christmas Crackers( Dinah and Maureen)

Thank You,  Dinah and Maureen for the Christmas Crackers. 

Forgive my ignorance, but this is my first time to HEAR💥 of this UK tradition.   Hurrah for the English! Maureen Bell is originally from UK. She is just learning how to play HongKong Mahjong.  I am very proud to be her Mahjong GURU! 

Maureen took our photo DURING mahjong time with Our Paper Crowns from the Christmas Crackers she gave us. I  have not pulled my Cracker and wait for Christmas Day to pull it and hear the Cracking Sound of Fireworks! 

💥Christmas crackers are a traditional Christmas favorite in the UK. They were first made in about 1845-1850 by a London sweet maker called Tom Smith. He had seen the French 'bon bon' sweets (almonds wrapped in pretty paper) on a visit to Paris in 1840. He came back to London and tried selling sweets like that in England and also included a small motto or riddle in with the sweet. But they didn't sell very well.

In 1861 Tom Smith launched his new range of what he called 'Bangs of Expectation'!

Legend says that, one night, while he was sitting in front of his log fire, he became very interested by the sparks and cracks coming from the fire. Suddenly, he thought what a fun idea it would be, if his sweets and toys could be opened with a crack when their fancy wrappers were pulled in half.

However, looking into the history of the Tom Smith company, it's thought that Tom actually bought the recipe for the small cracks and bangs in crackers from a fireworks company called Brock’s Fireworks. The story of him sitting by the fire was probably added to help sell his new items.

Crackers were also nicknamed called 'cosaques' and were thought to be named after the 'Cossack' soldiers who had a reputation for riding on their horses and firing guns into the air.

When Tom died, his expanding cracker business was taken over by his three sons, Tom, Walter and Henry. Walter introduced the hats into crackers and he also traveled around the world looking for new ideas for gifts to put in the crackers. The crowns might have been inspired from Epiphany cakes from Europe which are often decorated with a paper crown on the top.

The company built up a big range of 'themed' crackers. There were ones for bachelors and spinsters (single men and women), where the gifts were things like false teeth and wedding rings! There were also crackers for Suffragettes (women who campaigned to get women the vote), war heroes and even Charlie Chaplain! Crackers were also made for special occasions like Coronations. The British Royal Family still has special crackers made for them today!

For additional Details visit: 

https://www.whychristmas.com/customs/christmas-crackers