# Is Santa Clause public domain? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 2, 2003, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032 "2003-06-02T00:47:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mr\_Salads](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@Mr\_Salads](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Salads)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/1 "2003-06-02T00:47:45Z")
I’m looking to use Santa Clause for a story. Is it public domain, and if not, who owns the copyright? ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/2 "2003-06-02T00:54:12Z")
Definitely public domain. The modern image of Santa comes from many sources, but two instrumental ones are by Thomas Nast and Clement Clark Moore (possibly), both in the 19th century. No one owns Santa. Now if you took a particular image of Santa – say, from a Coca Cola ad – that image could be under copyright. But Santa himself is public domain. ---
**Author:** ![USCDiver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/uscdiver/32/354_2.png) [@USCDiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/USCDiver)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/3 "2003-06-02T00:54:43Z")
You mean the Tim Allen movie _The Santa Clause_ or the character who brings presents on Christmas, Santa Claus? ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/4 "2003-06-02T01:55:28Z")
_The Santa Clause_ is definitely under copyright. Santa Claus is public domain. Besides, if you get in trouble, just switch to Father Christmas or St. Nicholas. ---
**Author:** ![Dragonstar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e79b87/32.png) [@Dragonstar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dragonstar)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/5 "2003-06-02T04:00:09Z")
You need to find a public domain image. Thomas Nast’s illustrations are in the public domain. Haddon Sundblad’s (Coca-Cola Santa) aren’t. You may want to consult a copyright attorney. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Salads](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@Mr\_Salads](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Salads)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/6 "2003-06-02T05:01:20Z")
Is it possible to create an entirely new image of Santa and then get that copywritten? ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/7 "2003-06-02T05:26:33Z")
yes. Make this new Santa a Klingon! “You have been very dishonorable this year! a Bat’leth to the head!” SCHLUP! “And, Timmy, you have been a good boy and drank the blood of your enemies, here is a toy targ” ---
**Author:** ![Kallessa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/7993a0/32.png) [@Kallessa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kallessa)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/8 "2003-06-02T05:48:23Z")
I want a Klingon Santa to visit at my house! **Tars Tarkas** , thanks for an image that will bring joy to my heart forever! ---
**Author:** ![Zenster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/cdc98d/32.png) [@Zenster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zenster)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/9 "2003-06-02T06:06:31Z")
Sidebar: As noted by several people here, the current image of a bearded and rolly polly red cheeked Santa in a white trimmed red suit is entirely the manufacture of Coca Cola[sup]™[/sup]. Prior to their ad campaign introducing this now iconic image to the American soft drink consuming public, Santa was more often pictured as some sort of tall modestly built guy in a red suit wearing something akin to a Bishop’s mitre. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Salads](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@Mr\_Salads](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Salads)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 9:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/10 "2003-06-02T09:30:24Z")
Wait wait wait…so is the iconic image we’ve all come to know and love copywritten by Coca Cola?? I can’t even remember if there was anything remotely _different_ about him… I bet those guys copywrote the damn polar bears while they were at it! Sheesh. ---
**Author:** ![refusal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ac91a4/32.png) [@refusal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/refusal)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/11 "2003-06-02T11:21:38Z")
According to [Snopes](http://www.snopes.com/cokelore/santa.asp), it’s untrue that Coca Cola created the modern image of Santa. Prior to Coke’s Santa: > [@](#): > > The Santa Claus figure, although not yet standardized, was ubiquitous by the late 19th century. Santa was portrayed as both large and small; he was usually round but sometimes of normal or slight build; and he dressed in furs (like Belsnickle) or cloth suits of red, blue, green, or purple. A Boston printer named Louis Prang introduced the English custom of Christmas cards to America, and in 1885 he issued a card featuring a red-suited Santa. The chubby Santa with a red suit (like an “overweight superhero”) began to replace the fur-dressed Belsnickle image and the multicolored Santas. When Coke employed Haddon Sundblom to draw Santa, they simply used what was at that time becoming the standard image of Santa. > [@](#): > > the jolly, ruddy, sack-carrying Santa with a red suit and flowing white whiskers had become the standard image of Santa Claus by the 1920s, several years before Sundlom drew his first Santa illustration for Coca-Cola. (Despite previewing, I seem to screw up every post I’ve made lately, so if I inadvertantly wrote Satan for Santa and Kylie Incontinence Pants instead of Coca Cola, I apologise.) ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2003, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/12 "2003-06-02T12:32:19Z")
Let’s clear a few things up. 1. As pointed out, Coca Cola does not own the image of Santa, and did not create it. 2. What Coke (or possibly the artist) does hold copyright to are some (if not all – it depends on if they renewed the copyright) of the actual Coca Cola ad pictures. You need to check into the status of any of these, and you probably would not have the right to reproduce them (especially since the Coca Cola trademark is a significant part of them). 3. It’s “copyrighted,” not “copywritten.” 4. You can copyright any picture of Santa you create. It doesn’t matter what image you choose. However, that copyright doesn’t give you control over Santa’s image, just that particular image you created. 5. Yes, Coke has the copyright to the Coke polar bears. You can draw polar bears as much as you want, but you cannot make copies of the Coke polar bears. 6. To draw this together: copyright applies to one particular image and the right to make copies of it. It does not automatically apply generically to whatever is in that image. It only becomes copyright violation if you take that image make copies of it (this can be interpreted in various ways, but it’s extremely difficult to get a ruling on something that isn’t clearly a copy, as Harvey Comics discovered when they tried to sue “Ghostbusters” for violation). ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Salads](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@Mr\_Salads](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Salads)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2003, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-santa-clause-public-domain/179032/13 "2003-06-03T00:35:44Z")
Thanks for the clarification. Seeing as how Ive no intention of using Coke’s image of Santa, I shouldn’t run into problems.