Christmas comes early at downtown Wooster event

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas … Wait, what? Why is the City of Wooster’s parks and public maintenance team putting up some downtown holiday decorations in the middle of summer? Hold on to your sleigh because Saturday, July 19 is Main Street Wooster’s all-day celebration of Christmas in July.

The family-friendly event, sponsored by Western Reserve Group, has a variety of activities planned. Santa and Mrs. Claus will be in attendance. Santa will be under the pavilion from 9-11 a.m.

At 9 a.m. Mrs. Claus will lead ornament decorating. In honor of the day, the Clauses will wear their summer beach holiday attire. For more festive entertainment, the movie “Home Alone” will have a showing at 10 a.m. at the Lyric Theater.

Downtown merchants, eateries and cafés will have sidewalk sales and specials all day. Find a list of specific sales and specials at www.mainstreetwooster.org/ChristmasinJuly. For a twist on holiday music, steel drums will play Christmas carols.

Where did the idea of celebrating a winter holiday in July originate? It’s widely believed the first Christmas in July was celebrated in 1933 at a girls camp in North Carolina. The event was a reason for a mid-summer party and included Santa, carols and gifts. The idea became more widespread with the release of the 1940s movie “Christmas in July.”

Christmas in July’s popularity grew even more when, in 1942, a Washington, D.C. church used the event to collect holiday gift donations in plenty of time for them to be shipped for Christmas. A few years later during World War II, the post office held a Christmas in July event to collect gifts for troops overseas. Later, retailers started using the theme as well.

In honor of the Wooster origins of the candy cane, there will be a candy cane trail. Participants will obtain a passport at a participating location and head to each stop on the passport. Along the way the task will be to pick up different flavors and sizes of candy canes. Once the passport is complete, it may be dropped off at the Main Street Wooster offices at 377 W. Liberty St. to enter for a chance to win $50 in Downtown Dollars (a gift certificate to use at downtown businesses).

“We just want people to know that Wooster, Ohio is home to America’s first candy cane brought here by German-Swedish immigrant August Imgard in 1847,” Main Street Wooster’s Kerri Manley said.

According to history.com, Imgard decorated a small blue spruce with paper ornaments and candy canes.

Manley encourages all those attending Christmas in July to dress in holiday attire.

“It makes the event more fun and festive,” she said.