December 10, 1903
Leslie’s Weekly
SANTA CLAUS has taken to himself a side-partner up in the town of Danby, Vt., the land of maple sugar and buckwheat cakes, and never again will the happy Christmas season pass and any little child, however poor, in Danby or the country roundabout fail to receive some pretty gift from the depth of a Christmas-stocking or the bough of a Christmas tree. And this is the way it came about. Mr. Silas L. Griffith, a wealthy Vermont lumberman who died in California last July, left a will providing, among other good things, a fund of $2,500, the income of which is to be used each year in purchasing gifts for a Christmas-tree in the Congregational Church at Danby, it being stipulated also that these gifts are to be distributed among all the children of the village and the country a for several miles around, without regard to race, color, or condition. But Mr. Griffith, the new patron saint of Danby, went still further than this in his thoughtful and big-hearted Christmas scheme. He left the trustees of the church another $2,000, the income of which he directed should be used in purchasing shoes, clothing, and other necessaries for the poor children of Danby and vicinity, with careful instructions that no little one should be overlooked or neglected in this distribution.