Christmas Readings - 2018

It's Tuesday - December 25th, 2018 and it's time to celebrate Christmas. That means it's time for parties filled with presents along with good food and drink. It's a time for being with family and friends, showing kindness to strangers and doing all those other things we just don't seem to have time enough to do during the rest of the year.



And it's a time for tales of the supernatural. Authors like Charles Dickens, Jerome K. Jerome, John Kendrick Bangs and many others have used the Christmas season as an inspiration for ghost stories that don't so much scare us as fill us with wonder or make us laugh. And so Hour 25 will continue its long running tradition of reading you holiday stories with a twist of the supernatural to go along with your holiday celebrations.



We've got ghosts in castles, restless mummies in boxes and who knows what else. So light up your Christmas tree, pour yourself some egg nog and grab some Christmas cookies. Get comfortable because you're on a journey to the worlds of Christmas imagination with Mike Hodel's Hour 25 - The Hour That Stretches.



The Transplanted Ghost by Wallace Irwin

Americans with money can be sorta strange. After they have amassed their fortune they seek class and respectability and if they can't earn those things... well... they try and buy them. One thing they have done in this pursuit is to go over to England or Europe and buy titles or old mansions or even castles and then have them dismantled and sent home to America.



Our first story for tonight tells of the misadventures of a man who thought he had bought a haunted castle - because he thought that would make it even more valuable and classy - but for the life of him the ghost just won't appear. And along with that he has a beautiful daughter whom he keeps locked away because he's afraid that young adventurers will want to marry her for her money.



The protagonist of our story is set up for more than a few misadventures when he is invited to spend a night in that castle... on Christmas Eve.



Enjoy.







A Christmas Mummy by Richard Marsh

Christmas is a time when boxes can contain mysteries that might be toys or some other wonderful item. As a result a child's imagination can become overstimulated when presented with a large box on Christmas Eve - especially when told that the box contains a real mummy.



Who could blame a child for wanting to take a peek into such a box? But later - when mysterious scrapings and bumpings are heard coming from the room containing the box - that same child might be wishing she had less curiosity or at least less imagination.



Tonight's story brings you mysterious happenings on Christmas Eve when two young girls discover The Christmas Mummy.



Christmas Greetings from the Moon

I'll never forget Christmas Eve 1968 - when I went outside on a cold winter's night and looked up at the Moon, shining over snow and Christmas lights, and realized that at that very moment three men from Earth were circling that world. This proved that the Moon was not just a place for science fiction dreams but a real place just waiting to be explored. For a young man who had been dreaming of spaceflight for his whole life the inescapable reality of that moment was a dream come true.



So let us remember that as the crew of Apollo 8 orbited above our lifeless Moon that night, they looked back to see the Earth - a blue and green oasis floating against star filled blackness - and sent the world a Christmas greeting... The first ever from another world.





A Science Fictional Christmas

Back in the 1950's Galaxy Magazine had a tradition of publishing Christmas themed covers for their holiday season issues. {And now Hour 25 has something of a tradition of reprinting those covers for our Christmas show.} While looking at them I was struck by the similarities between what Santa does and what engineers do when designing and flying missions to other planets.





First you must establish your mission requirements...





Next you must plan your mission...





Then you must travel through space whilst being careful to account for any mid-course encounters with other objects or spacecraft...





Upon reaching your destination you must carefully deploy your payloads...





And when your mission is completed you can sit down with friends and give a toast to a job well done.





From all of us here at Hour 25, we wish you the very best for this holiday season whether you celebrate Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanzaa, or any other Solstice holiday. During this season celebrating Peace on Earth and Good Will To All be sure to spend some time with your family and friends. They are an island of peace in a world filled with stress and strife and should be treasured.



And remember, when happiness comes to your party be sure to give it a comfortable seat.



Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all.





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