NY Town Holds Mock Trial Over ‘Night Before Christmas’ Mystery

The town of Troy, N.Y. will hold a mock trial this week to get to the bottom of a centuries-old controversy: Who really wrote “A Visit from St. Nicholas”? The classic poem, also known as “The Night Before Christmas,” was first published anonymously in Troy’s Sentinel newspaper Dec. 23, 1823. A local lawyer will represent Clement Clark Moore, a New York City scholar credited with writing the holiday classic, and other attorneys have been enlisted to defend Henry Livingston Jr., a farmer whose descendants claim he wrote the poem. Actors portraying Moore and Livingston will take the stand.