Why We Still Love the Yule Log

This Christmas, countless Americans will celebrate the holiday with the mesmerizing flicker of a yule log as a backdrop to their domestic festivities, the glow emanating not from a traditional fireplace but from their flat-screen televisions, perhaps “hung by the chimney with care.” Traditional holiday tunes will surely accompany the video, sourced from the catalogues of Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby, or perhaps plucked from the more recent yuletide earworms of Mariah Carey and Paul McCartney.

The televised yule log has become commoditized, available on countless YouTube channels and streaming services, but all of these videos are knockoffs of the one true filmed fireplace that started it all — the WPIX-TV Yule Log.