One of my family’s favorite holiday movies is A Christmas Story. It was based on a collection of author Jean Shepherd’s short stories in the book In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash. When it premiered before Thanksgiving in 1983, it got mixed reviews and disappeared from theaters long before Christmas.
It didn’t really make much of a mark at first. Now, of course, it’s considered a Christmas classic, and you can catch it playing on television throughout the month of December.
I couldn’t find any good photos of the house, so I took these as I watched the movie. I love how they recreated the look and feel of an Indiana home in the 1940s.
Dad comes home and calls Ralphie downstairs. He has big news!
Dad makes an announcement. He just won a “Major Award!”
The box says “fra-gee-lay,” so “it must be from Italy!” Dad says. Turns out his Major Award is a lamp. A leg lamp.
Dad and the boys are excited. Mom isn’t so sure:
The leg lamp creates quite a stir in the neighborhood. A little trivia: the neighbor who comes up and asks what it is was Director Bob Clark in a cameo.
I love this old radio that Ralphie listens to his shows on. We had a very similar one in my house when I was growing up (no, I’m not THAT old–it was an antique when we got it!). A reader informs me that it’s a 1940 Canadian Westinghouse model 780-X. You can see a photo and get more information about the model here. (Thanks, Jan!)
Ralphie at the desk in his room. I love how he has the globe and a jar of marbles:
A view of the sink and washing machine on the other side of the kitchen:
What was that crashing sound? “Oops! I was just watering my plants, and the leg lamp broke!” What an unfortunate accident:
You can see the dining room, which isn’t really seen much otherwise, in this scene. Dad comes up from the basement when he hears the crash. He’s broken-hearted over his beloved leg lamp:
After Ralphie says “Fuuuudge,” he gets his mouth washed out with soap. In this shot from the bathroom you can see the landing with the family’s only phone hanging on the wall.
The family around the dinner table:
The family goes to Higbee’s Department Store to see Santa. All Ralphie wants is a Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-Shot, Range Model Air Rifle. But Santa is sort of terrifying, as are the elves, and Ralphie freezes up when the time comes to ask for it. (My kids never liked Santa, either. It’s hard to get a good photo when your child is screaming or crying or running the other way…)
I love this shot of the department store, all decked out for Christmas:
Putting the star on top of the tree can be dangerous:
Ralphie and Randy opening gifts on Christmas morning:
Ralphie gets a pink bunny suit made specially for him by his Aunt Clara, who “has always operated under the assumption that I’m a girl.”
His mom makes him try it on:
Just when he had given up hope, Ralphie gets the Red Ryder air rifle he was hoping for!
He goes outside and promptly “shoots his eye out,” sort of (but not really).
The ill-fated turkey, soon to be eaten by the “hillbilly neighbor’s” dogs. In the background you can see that the Parkers have decorated with a red paper chain in the dining room:
As we all know, the family ended up eating at the only place open on Christmas Day: a Chinese restaurant where the servers sing “Deck the Halls” and give them a duck to eat with its head still on.
The final shot in the movie shows the snow falling on the Parkers’ home with the Christmas tree blinking in the window:
The house that was used in the movie was bought in 2005 by a fan on eBay for $150,000. Brian Jones then spent a year and half a million dollars restoring the home to the way it looked on screen. The interior was completely redesigned to match the interior of the home shown in the movie, which had been filmed in a Toronto studio.
In 2006, he opened the home as a tourist attraction. He even purchased the house next door and converted it to a gift shop and museum dedicated to the film. Here’s how it looks today:
Go to A Christmas Story House for more information, photos of the actors who have visited the house, or to buy your own leg lamp! (You know you want one.)
A Christmas Story is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year with a convention, and you can read about it here. Another good article about the movie: 12 Things You Probably Didn’t Know About A Christmas Story.
Visit my TV/Movie Houses page to see all the other Christmas movies I’ve featured, from Christmas Vacation to Christmas in Connecticut!
My son first watched this movie when he was about 5 years old. We watched at least once during the holiday and then we watch every Christmas Eve. We love this movie.
I was driving down the road one day and saw a leg lamp in someone’s window. I turned around and drove past again to verify that’s what I was actually seeing. I then laughed so hard I nearly wet myself. As for the movie, it’s not a favorite of mine. I do love when the kid gets his tongue stuck to the flagpole though. LOL
I will admit, cautiously, that I haven’t seen this movie in its entirety. It is interesting to me to see period movies done within periods like this one about the 40s done in the 80s. I like to see each decade’s spin on another. Great synopsis, Julia–I can guess what you did this weekend!
And, man, oh, man, you gotta really love the movie to recreate the whole house! It is great that he knows what his passion is and goes after it with such gusto!
Hey Julia! We’ll be keeping your dad in our prayers!
This house is only 1 1/2 hours away from us….haven’t gone yet. We have those leg lamps in two homes on our neighborhood….one is us ALL YEAR LONG! Yulk!
Anyway, hope all is going well!
Karla & Karrie
Okay, who doesn’t love this movie? And who doesn’t love that for 24 hours on December 24th you can turn on TBS and find yourself in the middle of it?
Julia, where in Northern Indiana? I myself spent 4 fantastic years in South Bend.
Mike, we have family in Elkhart, Indiana–right down the street from South Bend!
If my father was still with us, I’d buy that lamp in a heart beat. My dad loved that movie. So much so, that after he saw it, the next day he took me and my boyfriend (now my husband) to see it. My husband and I have great memories of my dad laughing so hard watching the movie in the theaters. It’s a must see for our family during the holiday season. Movie night is coming up! YEAH!
Thinking of you all today and I hope your Dad is ok x
Update: I just got home from the hospital. They went in to clear the blockage in my dad’s heart and couldn’t find it. The surgeon says he’s baffled. It had disappeared. Very bizarre–but good news! He gets to go back home today. I think we’ll call it our “Christmas miracle.”
Of course Lily is sick now with a fever and home from school, so I’m off to drive her to the doctor. It’s always something. -Julia
Good news Julia! Hope your little one feels better soon too!
Whoah! Glad your Dad is doing well. Hope Lily feels better soon!
My daughter is suffering from some chest wall pain right now – not fun.
I love this movie, and really enjoyed this post. Thanks for stopping by my blog today. I have an even deeper appreciation for your amazing blog. My photos don’t look anything like the great pics you post that show such great detail of the homes you’re writing about.
Re: the palm lined drive – I’d love to do that at my place but I have a short stubby little drive way, it would look kinda funny, huh? lol
Grest news about your Dad, Julia! Here’s hoping Lily gets better soon.
I thought I was this movies’s number one fan! I dedicate a tree in my home each Christmas to it, and have watched it umpteenth times. Thanks for giving it the attention it deserves!!
Hope things settle down for you soon,
Linda
Has anyone else spotted “Ralphie” in the movie “Four Christmases?” My 22 year-old daughter could pick him out of a crowd at 100 paces. Me? I still can’t believe it’s really him … all grown up.
That’s wonderful news about your dad! I’ll keep him in my prayers and Lily, too. What a great post – I never knew all those interesting pieces of trivia. And I love the shot of decorated department store – I never noticed the details before. :0)
Greetings – over from Linda at the Lime… You know they’re auctioning an overnight on eBay at this house. You get to sleep over on Christmas Eve and have breakfast or something. And I think Christmas dinner is Chinese. Seriously.
I love this movie. One case where the movie outdid the book!
My goodness, how I looove this movie! Just looking through these pictures makes me excited to watch it again! “You’ll ‘shootcher’ eye out, kid!”
Hey! That’s my kitchen sink in there! Julia, glad to hear your Dad is fine and hope little Lily is recovering nicely, too.
I could watch that movie over and over. And do.
I’m so glad about your dad.
Rich loves that movie and I do too now. I had only seen it once years ago, but now it’s a Christmas must watch
I’m so sorry to hear about your dad having surgery. Prayers for him and your family.
(((hugs)))
rue
I was secretly hoping you wouldn’t do Ralphie’s house…’cause it was my back up plan for your bloggeriffic house tour next week.
But I’m glad you did…you do a way better tour than I would have, and I just LOVE this movie. Can you believe it’s 25 years old?? Crazy how time flies.
Hi Julia,
I love this movie, too! I remember a couple of years ago, Rite Aid had those leg lamps and I thought about getting one, lol. They were much smaller though and hey, if I’m going to get one, it might as well be the big one, right?
I hope all went well for your dad!
xoxo
Bella
Last year & this, The Christmas Story movie house in Cleveland had an online charity auction with the winner given 2 nights in the house and the chance to relive some of the scenes for themselves. A particularly enthusiastic young fellow paid over $4,000 for the experience as the movie meant so much to him!…Not only a generous fellow…he added a bit of spice and lots of what’s naughty and nice to the former movie set as seen in this link http://www.wkyc.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=127538
Hey…. wheres the stove i think i speak for all of us and ask to see the stove.. i cant find any pictures of the stove. my family bought a stove and the people that sold it to us said its the stove from the christmas story. i want to find out if its true.
Isn’t that the stove in the 3rd still? I grew up in Hammond. THIS house is wonderful – the real house in Hammond is dismal & uncared for. Not nearly as charming as the one in the movie. As a former Hammond citizen, I keep thinking they will do something one day with the potential asset. In the middle of the last century, I attended a pre-K summer school program in the last-standing building left from the original Harding Elementary School ‘Ralphie’ went to. It was an old gym-type building with numerous giant, paned windows that could still be pushed open with one of those long sticks with the strange hook on the end for the purpose. The morning dew was still on, the birds were singing thru the open windows – the whole room was a great golden oak sunbean. It was a very early summer morning & I can hear “John Jacob Jingleheimer Smith (da da da da da da da)” still echoing as we sang with the piano banging about in that big hall. That’s the very last of Jean Shepherd’s world I knew. They have a modern structure named after him as a community center, but otherwise that’s all. Perhaps someone will wise up one day in Hammond. The plot of land the school stood on is still empty – ideas anyone? No? Ho Hum. Local government.
Hello. This house still sits there in exactly the same shape. I found a page on facebook of people who have actually visited it. It is a museum now. It’s cool you should look it up!
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