Do you remember the day that you first realized there is no Santa Claus?

Well, you can forget your disappointment. The world has a Santa Claus and he is living at the North Pole. That is, the town of North Pole, Alaska.

Santa is one of six members serving on the North Pole city council and was elected in 2015 to a three-year term.

So you probably wouldn’t be surprised to learn that at an October North Pole city council meeting, he voted in favor of the town accepting a $604,229 bid to renovate its Santa’s Senior Center. You can read the minutes for this and other North Pole City Council meetings on their website at: http://www.northpolealaska.com/citycouncil

Everything was going just fine for Santa (his legal name since 2005) until the Facebook Grinch stepped in last year. According to a Dec. 29, 2016 story in the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, Facebook shut down Santa’s page on – wait for it – Christmas Day. Access to his Facebook account was blocked as the social media giant demanded he produce proof of his identity.

Santa sent along his driver’s license and passport and included an appointment letter from the state’s governor. Finally, after a few days, the Grinch released its grasp and Santa’s page was reinstated.

No reason for the snafu was given by Facebook.

All of which is oddly reminiscent of a question posed in the Sept. 21, 1897 edition of the New York SUN.

“Dear Editor,” the question reads, “Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?”

In answering Virginia O’Hanlon’s question, Francis Pharcellus Church wrote a lovely editorial about the joy of youth and the holiday spirit that just might lead someone to take Santa Claus as his legal name.

“No Santa Claus!” Church wrote, “Thank God! He lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.”

Mr. Church said it best.  All that remains is to add:

Yes, Mr. Zuckerberg, there really is a Santa Claus.