Memories of Christmas Past
- pb0733
- Dec 22, 2014
- 3 min read
Perhaps you’ll be interested to know I took my own travel advice from last week and took a trip down memory lane. My little journey dusted off some memories of Christmas time in our corner of the state.
I am starting to feel like an “old timer” as I spin yarns about “the way it used to be back in the day.” But for those that haven’t been here all their lives (like me) then you might get a kick out of some of the Christmas traditions.
In the ‘60’s, every church had a version of the nativity. Kids drug their housecoats and bath towels to Sunday School to play a shepherd for the big Christmas program usually performed in place of the Sunday evening service. Moms loaned their jewelry boxes for the gold and there was a fancy bottle of bubble bath that we recognized as Frankensense. Who knew what the stuff really looked like? In the ‘60s it was always was a cut glass container with a stopper that could double as the “I Dream of Jeannie” abode during the off season. I hate to admit this, but I was a pretty big kid before I realized that the three wise men and the three kings were the same people. There were six foreigners bareing gifts in my mind’s manager… which made it more crowded, but a bigger party with more presents.
Not only did the churches cast the nativity, most grades school classrooms included it as part of the Christmas party along with Jingle Bells and Frosty. I was in Mrs. Jessie Dubois’ first grade class and was proud to be cast as the Virgin Mary, my serious acting debut. OK, it was less about the character and more about who in the class had a boy baby doll. Of course, no one had an anatomically correct toy in that day, mine just didn’t have curls on its noggin. So I was a shoo-in as the mother of Jesus. We had more angels than sheep, white bed sheets flapping on the tops of the school desks and halos of gold tinsel garland topping little girls’ heads. There were no boy angels, boys were over there with the bath towels tied on their heads, with the imaginary sheep.
The high school art class transformed the downtown merchants’ windows into a Christmas gallery of art. The plate glass windows became the canvas for gallons of tempura paint and a Christmas scene to enjoy until after the first of the year or the first driving rain, whichever came first. Charlie Brown, Santa Claus and the manager scene all were bigger than life, filling windows with color. Some were better than others, I remember Dawne Vernon (now Erickson) being our local Michaelangelo.
The Christmas Parade day was a full one, with Jay, Grove and Miami all being the same day. School buses scooted up and down the highway dumping out trumpets and gathering up drummers as everyone was on a tight schedule. It seemed like every kid was in the parade, in a band, boy scouts, or riding a church float. There were mobs of little cheerleaders, and packs of little twirlers. Miami had the impressive night time parade, and if we were lucky, there was a trip to the Kuku to follow. That one still happens, I’ll bet.
Thanks for traveling with me down Christmas past memory lane. And for any aspiring Marys out there, ask Santa for a boy doll.

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