In 1891, Julina Lambson Smith, wife of President Joseph F. Smith, wrote a reminiscence for Susa Young Gates about their shared Christmas in Hawaii five years earlier – both women accompanied their missionary husbands, and had their young families with them.

Salt Lake City
December 17th, 1891

Dear Susa:

I have just been reviewing some of your own writings which I copied in my private journal, when we were sojourners together on a foreign shore; and I am reminded of our Christmas in 1886, in that far off tropical land, where the earth puts on its most beautiful carpet of green, and decks her brow with fragrant flowers and luscious fruits during the holiday season, in such contrast to the bleak and chilly nature of our mountain home at this season of the year.

As we are again approaching the ever memorable Christmas holiday it may not be amiss for me to revert briefly to our recollections of the time I speak of. We were on missions then, and missionaries do not always far so well as we did, I suppose, and yet it seemed to me as though we could not reach the height of our desire as we might have done at home.

Although we were on missions, we also were favored with the presence of a number of our little ones, some of our colony being blessed with the presence of their entire families.

There were, if I remember right, nine mothers of us, missionaries from Zion, and the number of our children seventeen; of course I will not attempt to speak of our dusky but warm-hearted friends, the Hawaiians, among whom we sojourned, although the they had learned to lisp in broken English, “Merry Christmas” and “Happy New Year,” and appreciate their pleasures too.

But to my little story of Christmas 1886, at Laie, on the Sandwich Islands. Our visions of “old Santa Claus” dressed in his heavy furs, with reindeers and sleigh loaded with good things for the little folks, were very dim and distant.

He would have seemed more appropriate to us, then, clad in nankeen, with sunshade and umbrella to protect him from the heat and rain, and sailing on a boat over the ocean waves or the lakes of water formed by the heavy, warm rains; and as for Christmas trees, all the trees were green and beautiful everywhere, so that a leafless, dry or withered one might have answered the purpose better, as it would have served to remind us somewhat of the barren, frozen appearance of the trees at home. But we did not trouble ourselves about a Christmas tree, although the little ones did not fail to “hang up their stockings” for whatever dear old Santa Claus might see fit to fill them with, in so warm a clime.

Several days before, the old rag dolls had disappeared and now were undergoing numerous repairs; clean coverings were put upon them, and they were dressed in new, bright colored clothes, and made “as good as new,” with little cost to Santa Claus, for it was over thirty miles to his source of supplies, and a very rough road to travel; and yet good Santa did not shrink from his pleasing duty, for on Christmas eve when the children slept, he came, and it was my good fortune to get a glimpse of him (I might say them) on his (or their) arrival. I will say them and their for Santa Claus, on this occasion, at least, was a noun of numbers.

As reindeers and sleighs were out of the question and the snow all fell in heavy liquid drops instead of light frozen flakes, poor Santa Claus was in a pretty plight. He had ridden on horse back for thirty-two miles in a pouring rain, and although clad in gossamer, or light rubber coat with umbrella, he was drenched through and through, the water proof saddle-bags scarcely keeping their contents dry. Before entering the house he was forced to take off his boots and pour out the water they contained, they being full and running over.

On Christmas morning the little ones found that Santa Claus had done his duty the best he could, notwithstanding the pouring rain, and having to face the storm on horse-back instead of gliding over the beautiful snow in his beautiful sleigh with prancing reindeers covered with bells and wrapped in costly furs and rugs. Besides poor Santa was on a mission, too, devoting his energies to another and a worthier cause, and spending his time and much of his means without compensation or earthly reward.

As it was, however, little Jay and Karlie each got a Jew’s harp, David a harmonica and Tommie a book, and Joseph and Wesley a whistle, and Lulu and May and Edna and Erma and Ella and Viola and Vera and Helen and Ina each got a doll and a book or some beads and other nice things, and all were supplied with candy and nuts. The candy was mostly the product of Santa himself, made from the sugar of the Laie mills.

Nor were the little ones only remembered, for some of the older bones fared quite as well. Santa remembered from far o’er the ocean, his friends and beloved ones, in distant land dwelling, and in time for the holidays lovingly sent them sweet tokens of friendship, his kindness revealing.

On Christmas morning Bros. S. and D. started for Honolulu thence to the Island of Maui on a mission tour to be gone for some time. Theirs was a toilsome, weary Christmas, without much happiness, I trow, but they had to catch the steamer and, therefore, could not stay. This was a source of discomfort to some of us, and had a dampening effect upon the enjoyment of the day. A Christmas dinner was served in good Lanihuli style, consisting of roast pig and poi, bread and butter, stewed chicken, roast beef, baked beans, sweet and Irish potatoes, plum pudding, fruit and plain cake, mince and custard pies, guava jelly, bananas, oranges, etc., etc. And everybody on the plantation enjoyed himself the best he could. But the crowning event of the day was Nellie’s surprise party, which terminated at two p.m. in the birth of her baby, “Freddie,” adding another to our number, and the finest Christmas gift of them all. ((I am working to identify this mother and child. The usual identification doesn’t appear to me to be correct.)) After this, most of us went down to the sea for a bath. Only think of it! Bathing in the sea on Christmas day! and all the little children with their feet stripped bare, playing on the sand and wading in the surf on the sea shore, while the older ones were swimming and diving in the ocean.

Someone has suggested that we “swam like lead and dove like a balloon,” but you well know what a libel that is upon our swimming and diving attainments. So I need not stop to resent it here.

Taken altogether I think our Christmas of 1886 was exceedingly interesting to those who participated in it; more especially the unwritten part of it, the description of which I will leave to an abler pen than mine.

In conclusion, I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, not forgetting the missionaries in distant lands and upon the islands of the sea.

As ever faithfully, your sister,

Julina L.