A 1955 instructional video on Making Christmas Tree Ornaments

It may be a bit late for this year, but this 17-minute educational short should be really handy next year when prepping for the holiday, even though it features some of the most mirthless narration in any Christmas short.

1962's THE BIG DOWNTOWN CHRISTMAS presents a child exploring downtown Chicago in the holiday season

Okay, so the narration by our lead young man (Burton Moore, though the boy is played in the film by Eric Bettelheim) is a bit grating, but Charles D. Sharp's short shows off the Chicago Loop in the early '60s to great effect, serving as a Chicago Christmas equivalent to 1953's LITTLE FUGITIVE.

1975's THE SANTA TAPES takes a behind the scenes look at a department store Santa

Scott Jacobs' timepiece is a great, if downbeat, documentary/interview on Art Baldwin, an Chicago Marshall Fields' Santa in which he talks about his career, the kids he deals with and lack of decent pension, all with barely a hint of holiday cheer.

Jennifer Beals promotes Chicago in a 1987 commercial

The FLASHDANCE star looks forward to reconnecting with old friends.  The commercial doesn't really sell the city, so maybe it's just geared towards people that already have memories of growing up there?  Or maybe people that know Jennifer Beals?

A 1972 Second City sketch featuring John Belushi, Harold Ramis and Joe Flaherty

Directed by Del Close, this recording of an early '70s sketch about a funeral that everyone has a tough time taking completely seriously due to the cause of death of the funerallee isn't the greatest quality, but it's still a pretty amazing timepiece, and watching Belushi, Ramis, Flaherty and the rest of the SC crew unable to keep a straight face is a joy to watch.

Watch This Thing - 1978 Student film mini-documentary on THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW at the Biograph Theater in Chicago

If you lined up all of the ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW documentaries end to end, you'd have a, well, a very lengthy thing indeed.  But this particular 5-minute doc is one of the earliest, made by Columbia College student Jim Doherty in 1978, emphasizing the RHPS fandom at Chicago's Biograph theater, and is certainly a fascinating time piece of midnight movie fandom in the Chicago area.  The Biograph is notable as the theater in which Dillinger was shot in 1934, and is no longer showing films today.  (I do, however, have great memories of seeing the likes of Jack Hill, John Waters and Doris Wishman there for screenings.)