Hansel and Gretel are the young children of a poor woodcutter. When a famine settles over the land, the woodcutter's second wife tells him to take the children into the woods and leave them there to fend for themselves. The woodcutter opposes the plan, but his wife repeats her demands until he reluctantly agrees. They are unaware that in the children's bedroom, Hansel and Gretel have overheard them. After the parents have gone to bed, Hansel sneaks out of the house and gathers as many shiny white pebbles as he can, then returns to his room, reassuring Gretel that God will not forsake them.

The next day, the children's stepmother gives them small pieces of bread before she and their father take them into the woods. As the family walks deeper, Hansel leaves a trail of white pebbles. After their parents abandon them, the children stay in the woods until night falls and the moonlight reveals the white pebbles shining in the dark. The children then safely follow the trail back home, much to their stepmother's rage. Once again, provisions become scarce and the stepmother angrily orders her husband to take the children further into the woods and leave them there. Hansel attempts to gather more pebbles, but finds his stepmother has locked the door.

The following morning, the children's stepmother gives them smaller pieces of bread, before she and their father take them back into the woods. As the family treks, Hansel leaves a trail of bread crumbs for him and Gretel to follow back home. However, after they are once again abandoned, the children find that the birds have eaten the crumbs and they are lost in the woods.

Obsolete words. Unlike "archaic" words which are old, maybe even tired, but have simply fallen out of common use, "obsolete" words as simply no longer used at all. As one literary site puts it:

Believe it or not ...  words do “disappear” ... For an English word to be considered obsolete, there can’t be any evidence of its use since 1755 – the year of publication of Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary.

To that point, pastor and writer Joseph Parker (1830-1902) provided commentary on the closing words of Isaiah 35:10, which state, "Sorrow and sighing will flee away." He expressed,

"When searching for the meaning of certain words in a dictionary, you will occasionally come across a word marked as 'obsolete.' The time has come for sorrow and sighing to become obsolete in our lives. The things that mar life here and now will become part of the past."

In 1882, in a townhouse at 136 East 36th Street in New York City, Edward Hibberd Johnson had an idea that would make him the unsung set decorator of a zillion holiday snapshots. Although Christmas trees became popular between 1840 and 1870, what really made them were the candles. While they were festive, they were also a fire hazard.

Johnson, who worked with Thomas Edison, set up a tree by the street side window of their store. Johnson hand-wired 80 red, white, and blue light bulbs, strung them together around the tree, and placed the trunk of the tree on a revolving pedestal, all powered by a generator. The lights drew a crowd as passersby stopped to gaze at the glowing marvel. Johnson turned this and the practice of doing more each year into a tradition.

At that time, a string of 16 vaguely flame-shaped bulbs sitting in brass sockets the size of shot glasses sold for $12 - about $350 in today’s money. By 1914, that same set cost just $1.75. By the 1930s, colored bulbs and cones were everywhere.

Today, an estimated 150 million light sets are sold in America each year, adding to the tangled millions stuffed into boxes each January. They light 80 million homes and consume 6 percent of the nation’s electrical load each December.  And though the contagious joy of these lights has been co-opted orange at Halloween, and red at Valentine's Day, it all started with Johnson’s miracle on 36th Street.