Tiny Tim Was Originally Little Fred

Tiny Tim Was Originally Little Fred
Charles Dickens’ classic novella, A Christmas Carol tells the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, a man who hates Christmas. Scrooge adopts the spirit of Christmas after being visited by the ghost of Christmas Past, Present, and Future. The story was credited for inspiring a rejuvenation of Christmas spirit in England in the 1800s. One of the beloved characters from the story is “Tiny Tim”, the ill son of Scrooge’s underpaid employee Bob Cratchit. The original name given to Tiny Tim was “Little Fred”. Dickens had brothers named Frederick and Alfred. According to some sources, it was Dickens’s wife who suggested giving the character an alliterative name. Even though Tiny Tim is a minor character in A Christmas Carol, he played a very important role in Scrooge’s awakening, and many critics say the story would not have been as appealing with “Little Fred”. A Christmas Carol was written in just six weeks, and was first published in England on 17 December 1843.

1. Tiny Tim is a minor, yet symbolic, character from Charles Dickens’s classic novella A Christmas Carol.
2. The report mentions Dickens’s brothers’ names because they both had the word “Fred” in them. The original name Dickens used for Tiny Tim was “Little Fred”.
3. It took Charles Dickens six weeks to write A Christmas Carol.