Christmas always falls on the same date.

December 25th.

Hanukkah, on the other hand, begins on the 25th day of Kislev, a month on the Jewish lunar calendar.

That corresponds to late November or sometime in December, making these two winter holidays like distant, but related cousins.

- I grew up in a school where I was the only Jewish kid in my grade and one of two in the whole school.

What was it like for you growing up?

Jewish and in America where Christmas is king?

- I feel kind of left out.

- Do you talk to your friends about Hanukkah?

- Not really.

- It was a battle that, that couldn't be won really.

Like Christmas was the king.

- The LeeVees vent that frustration in this song titled "Goyim Friends" about their pals who are not Jewish.

- [Singing] All my goyim friends are making up their lists and all my goyim friends get some pretty sweet gifts like snowboards, cell phones, paintball guns, and iPods.

Our non-Jewish friends are getting the best gifts right now during Christmas.

- I was a bit of a smart ass and I would, you know, challenge my friend.

I'm like, oh, well we get eight days of gifts.

- Like the reality of yes, you get eight days of presents and those presents are far inferior.

[Singing] Six-pack of socks from each of our moms.

And we used to put down socks but socks are amazing.

- That's all I want now.

- A box!

Look what I got for Hanukkah!

- The nicest box I've ever seen!

- Yeah!

So I just really wanna get into it, like the pajamas, the clothes, the food, the family.

- The presents!

Okay!

I don't wanna do that!

Oh boy.

How do we feel about presents?

- I like them.

- Yeah.

- We do one every night, right?

Changes a bit every year, too.

- Because we're interfaith too, it, it depends on if it overlaps with Christmas.

- Right?

- Look, it's, it's always been a time of giving.

Certainly in, in the old country there was gelt little, you know, coins that were given and treats and games.

So it was always a time of festivity and, and giving gifts to one another.

That modest tradition got magnified in the late 19th century as Jews emigrated in large numbers from Europe to the United States.

Christmas had just become a national holiday with festivities filled to the brim.

- Jewish parents saw how beautiful Christmas was, saw how it was everywhere, trees and decorations and music, and didn't want their children to feel bad that they weren't celebrating this beautiful holiday.

And neither did two Jewish leaders from Cincinnati rabbis Isaac Mayer Wise and Max Lilienthal.

They grew concerned that many American Jews weren't celebrating Hanukkah opting instead for the mirth and merriment of Christmas.

- That was very common, especially of German Jewish families who wanted to acculturate and wanted to take in beautiful things about being American.

It often didn't have anything to do with the religious parts of the holiday.

- The rabbis saw how churches appealed to children.

So they planned, family focused Hanukkah festivals at their synagogues and in their weekly Jewish newspapers.

They encouraged other temples to do the same.

That tradition continues today.

- I think it has led Jewish people to look deeper at Hanukkah and to want to celebrate our holiday.

I feel like Hanukkah gets to enjoy some of Christmas's glow.

Christmas can be such an important holiday for folks, - But the truth is, even Christmas and the sort of commercialization around Christmas is a pretty recent phenomenon.

[Singing] Holiday time's a good time for the good taste of Coke!

- The first wave of mass advertising came in the 1920s and thirties, and with it Coca-Cola's now ubiquitous image of a rotund man in red.

And in the decades that followed the picture, perfect Christmas was being sold on airwaves across the nation.

Give the - Gift that keeps on giving - This Christmas, your kids can have this colorful, cuddly, Burger King doll.

[Singing] Add an extra touch to Christmas with a gift from Burger King!

Americans open their hearts easier to handle, and their wallets - This Christmas gets your boy a train that's built for the way young boys play: A big rugged Lionel Christmas has become much more focused on, you know, domesticity, more focused on consumerism.

So it shouldn't surprise us.

Maybe if Hanukkah has undergone a similar kind of evolution - Today you can walk into many big box stores and find shelves lined with Hanukkah items.

- Well, now Jewish kids can get on in all the fun, much like the Elf on the Shelf, there's the Mensch on the Bench and it is selling out in toy stores.

- So is there an irony in this, because, you know, in some ways modern day observance is a, it's a kind of assimilation of Christmas tradition, but the origin of Hanukkah itself is to reinforce your own culture against assimilation.

- Yeah.

So there's a, it's really a fascinating irony, But if somebody's gonna buy it, then somebody's gonna produce it.