Christmas is for the kid in all of us—and most of us remember a simpler time when what we wanted for Christmas was our biggest worry! The holiday classic A Christmas Story perfectly captures those childhood yearnings. This sweetly innocent 1940s tale of Ralphie and his fantasy of receiving the Red Ryder BB gun with a compass in the stock resonates with every one of us who’s ever dreamed of a special holiday gift.
Director Bob Clark’s now-classic tale opened to unremarkable box office numbers in 1983 but has since become a fan favorite that is played on a 24-hour loop on cable every holiday season. The original movie was based loosely on satirist and radio personality Jean Shepherd’s 1966 novel In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash.
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The author grew up in Hammond, Indiana, but director Bob Clark couldn’t find a setting he loved there, so he headed to a different city altogether to create the most classic scenes, including the house from A Christmas Story.
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For anyone who can quote the movie’s lines from memory, it’s not Christmas without watching this cult classic every year. From “You’ll shoot your eye out,” to “It’s a major award” when the Old Man wins his infamous leg lamp, this movie is part of many families’ holiday traditions—so much that a sequel, A Christmas Story Christmas, starring Peter Billingsley, the original Ralphie as the now-grown-up Ralphie, was released in 2022.
If you’ve ever wondered where A Christmas Story House is located, we double-dog-dare you to read on to learn all about where this pop culture favorite was filmed:
Where Was A Christmas Story House?
Director Bob Clark reportedly scouted 20 different cities in the early 1980s to find a location for the house from A Christmas Story. Clark also sent letters to 100 department stores around the country because he needed a vintage department store scene for the Christmas parade and visiting Santa scenes (“Hey kid, hurry up, the store’s closing!”).
Higbee’s in downtown Cleveland responded, and a house in the nearby Tremont neighborhood of Cleveland, 3159 West 11th, turned out to be ideal. The producers showed their thanks to the city by naming the house’s fictional street Cleveland Street. The house has since been designated a Cleveland historic landmark.
Can You Visit A Christmas Story House?
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About 20 years after the movie’s release, a California entrepreneur, Brian M. Jones, bought the house on eBay for $150,000. He used money from his business, the Red Rider Leg Lamp Company, for the down payment. A longtime fan, Jones drew interior plans by watching the movie frame-by-frame, restoring it to a replica of the movie, right down to the leg lamp.
Today, you can tour the house and museum across the street, which includes many of the movie’s original props. What’s even more fun for diehard fans is that you can stay overnight at the house. The Bumpus House next door, home of the 785 smelly hound dogs who steal the Christmas turkey, is also available for overnight stays.
Where Was A Christmas Story Filmed?
In addition to the department store filming location in Cleveland, Ohio, A Christmas Story also was filmed in Canada. The scenes at Warren G. Harding School were shot at the Victoria School in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, which has a museum with movie artifacts including an original script. The Victoria School has since been converted to a women’s shelter.
Other exterior scenes were filmed in Toronto, including the flat tire (where Ralphie says “The word. The big one. The Queen Mother of Dirty Words.”) and Christmas tree lot (“Haven’t you got a big tree?”). Other interior scenes were filmed on a stage set.
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