By far the best selling collectible character of all times, however, was a real life saint whose feast day is celebrated tomorrow, December 6.

I'm speaking, of course, about St. Nicholas, aka Santa Claus, Sinter Klaus, Pere Noel and Kris Kringle.
Nicholas was the bishop of a city in ancient Turkey all the way back in the 4th Century. The three miracles that helped raise him to sainthood involved saving men from political persecution, women from poverty and prostitution, and children from being slaughtered.
You gotta love a guy who does stuff like that, and everybody did love St. Nick. In fact, he became so popular that folks changed their family names to the likes of Nicholas, Nichols, Nicholson and Klaus.