 According to "Readers Digest Merry Christmas Song Book", Hanby probably owes the idea that Santa and his sleigh land on the roofs of homes to Clement C. Moore's 1822 poem, "A Visit from St. Nicholas" (also commonly known as "The Night Before Christmas").Benjamin Russell Hanby was born in 1833 near Rushville, Ohio, the son of a minister involved with the Underground Railroad.During his short life, he wrote some 80 songs before dying of tuberculosis in 1867.