A highlight of the event was a Civil War-era Union Santa Claus, based on an 1863 cover of Harper’s Weekly by artist Thomas Nast.

Thomas Nast, the German-born editorial cartoonist for Harper’s Weekly magazine, came up with both of them — he introduced the donkey first, on Jan. 19, 1870: 155 years ago Sunday.

Thomas Nast was crucial in shaping Santa's image. Global influences on Santa's iconic look In 1863, during the Civil War, he depicted Santa in stars and stripes, handing out presents to Union ...

This contributed to German immigrant and Civil War cartoonist Thomas Nast’s portrayal, who drew Santa Claus in an 1862 Christmas edition of Harper’s Weekly.

Many people pass on the urban legend that Santa Claus's red suit was created by Coca Cola, but that is untrue. Thomas Nast had Santa running around in his red and white ensemble years before Coca ...

In the mid-19th century the illustrator Thomas Nast portrayed Santa as a jolly old man in Harper’s Weekly, and the illustration and the archetype took off.

A mid-19th-century cartoonist, Thomas Nast, drew him for Harper’s Weekly, giving him much of his now-timeless look. Today Santa is a quintessentially American symbol of Christmas.

By the 1880s, an illustrator for “Harper’s Monthly Magazine,” named Thomas Nast, incorporated all the various circulating ideas about Santa Claus into his work, creating a series of drawings ...

In 1881, Santa's image was solidified by cartoonist Thomas Nast who depicted Mr. Claus as a large man with a white beard, red suit and a sack full of toys.

The traditional image of Santa Claus, deeply rooted in 19th-century American culture, emerged primarily through Thomas Nast’s illustrations in Harper’s Weekly starting in 1863.