Do you believe in magic? The lore of the ‘Smokey Mountain Santa’
Standing in the lobby of North Canton Elementary School last Friday morning, one could hear and witness the frenzied nature of students and faculty alike, all eager for the upcoming holidays. And though Christmas is just around the corner, one might think otherwise with the unusually green front lawn and warm sunshine cascading across the mountains of Western North Carolina.
SEE ALSO:
• The man behind the white beard
• The gift of reading
Passing by doorways full of smiling faces, the cinematic sounds of “The Polar Express” and Christmas music echo down the hallways. Turning into Mrs. Christina Roberts and Mrs. Carol Harkins kindergarten classroom, the teachers are wrangling all 15 of their students that day in preparation to get the space in order for their special guests.
The man behind the white beard
So, just who is the “Smokey Mountain Santa”? After an appearance last week at North Canton Elementary School, Santa and Mrs. Claus (Dennis and Deborah Reed) made note of all the joy and support they’ve not only received from the community, but also aim to spread and share day in and day out.
This must be the place
She grabbed for my hand and held it up.
“No ring, huh? You should meet my daughter sometime. Single. Beautiful. I think y’all would get along pretty well.”
Christmas in Appalachia
As the temperatures drop in Western North Carolina, the fun only heats up. The holiday season here is filled with events and activities aimed to celebrate the best way we know how — with friends, family and visitors alike.
This must be the place
It’s awfully quiet in here. As the rest of the newspaper heads out the door for home (or somewhere they used to call “home”), I sit at my desk. Relaxing back into my chair and staring out of the window, I’m not looking at anything in particular, with thoughts drifting into that bluebird sky outside.
This holiday, it’s a family united
When I was 12 years old, there were few things I liked better than the Dallas Cowboys. Definitely my Farrah Fawcett poster. Maybe Fudge Royale ice cream. But not much else.
Investing in what’s best about WNC
While I was living in Elizabethtown in southeastern North Carolina in 1988, Walmart opened a brand-new store. Most everyone was excited, and how could you blame them? The retail giant hadn’t yet taken over the world, although it was already by then the largest retailer in the U.S. But how could you argue with the cheap prices all the one-stop variety, especially in an area that was poverty-stricken as textile mills were shuttering their operations?
Support small businesses Saturday
What would Western North Carolina’s small towns be like without a strong base of small businesses?
Time to break the holiday laws of inertia
Two miserable characters — the larger one in a terry cloth bathrobe and fleece pajama bottoms, the smaller one in his new school clothes and orange parka — stand at the bus stop, huddled together in a sad and pathetically ineffective attempt to generate some small bit of warmth between them on a brutally cold and windy January morning, the first day of school and work after Christmas vacation.
Teachers worry that their students will lose momentum or enthusiasm for learning during their time away from school right in the middle of the school year, but the boy in his new school clothes has indeed learned something over these past few weeks. He has learned about inertia, not just the dictionary definition of it, but the implacable reality of it.
The best things come in the smallest packages
Looking up at the old chimney, William “Gene” Gibson still wonders how Santa Claus ever managed to fit in it.
“I never could figure how’d he come down through there and not get all covered in black,” the 87-year-old chuckled.