Good article, Guest 999.

Here are some additional links regarding "Old Christmas."

Old Christmas

Epiphany

I recall (vaguely) stories told by my grandparents and great grandparents about drunk elders, bonfires and the firing of guns into the air on "Old Christmas." (Both sides of my family had crossed the pond and migrated to the southern Appalachians before the Revolutionary War -Welch, Germanic, Irish, Scots, and Scotch-Irish.)