Take a look at a some of the history behind Macon’s Christmas lights extravaganza
When he flips the light switch, and Poplar Street begins to twinkle, Bryan Nichols has a glow all of his own.
“I don’t even notice the lights anymore,’’ he said. “I’m looking at the people.’’
There are more than 700,000 lights in the Main Street Christmas Extravaganza. That is four bulbs for every man, woman and child in the county. And a partridge in a pear tree.
But the crowds are catching up with the light bulbs. An estimated 100,000 folks showed up when it premiered two years ago, and the numbers doubled last year. By the time the extravaganza “goes dark’’ — to use a stage term — on Jan. 4, the figures still will be trending upward.
For the holidays, Poplar Street is Popular Street.
“Where else can you have black and white, young and old, rich and poor, Republicans and Democrats, Auburn fans and Alabama fans?’’ Bryan said. “Everything we use by human nature to separate us is non-existent. Nobody is thinking about any of it. They’re out there in the middle of the street, hanging out with their friends and neighbors. People will come and think they’re just going to walk through right quick. Three hours later, they’re still out there in the middle of the lights.’’
The radiance stretches across four and a half blocks, hanging and hugging five different types of trees and just about every fixture that’s nailed down. The lights are synchronized to the music of the Macon Pops. And where else can you see live reindeer four nights before Santa hooks them up to his sleigh?
“It truly is an art form,’’ Bryan said.
Clark Griswold, eat your heart out.
What once was an avenue of barren storefronts and silent nights has been transformed into a signature street of urban revitalization, bristling with shops and restaurants. The lights not only illuminate this, they helped show the way.
Bryan, 48, is co-owner of the Taste & See Coffee Shop and Gallery and a champion of historic preservation in the city. He and his business partner, Kevin Reaves, are opening a rock-climbing gym on Cotton Avenue next year in the same row of old buildings that once housed the executive offices of Capricorn Studios. Hence, the name, Macon Rocks, is only fitting.
Bryan has had the high-voltage energy necessary to make this project sparkle and shine. In October, he was recognized, along with NewTown Macon, as a recipient of the Downtown Achievement Award of Excellence by the International Downtown Association at its conference in Baltimore.
He has spent considerable time stringing lights from the top of a 45-foot boom — sometimes at a frigid 2 a.m. in the morning — but he acknowledges he stands on the shoulders of others. He has a long list of foundations, business owners and civic-minded groups to thank for plugging into the idea. In the beginning, during one of Bryan’s rare, low moments of uncertainty, NewTown Macon executive director Josh Rogers slapped him on the back and said: “Bryan, if anybody can to this, you can.’’
Not long after he opened the coffee shop six years ago, several holiday displays, including the marquee “Season’s Greetings” lights and Coleman Hill nativity scene, were conspicuously absent. They had been vandalized while being stored at a city warehouse.
With a little help from his friends, Bryan rolled up his sleeves and went to work. The Grinch wasn’t going to win this one.
“When I was putting out the displays, people kept stopping and thanking me,’’ he said. “They would tell me about coming downtown and what it meant to them to see those displays. Some would reminisce even further back to Cherry Street. They would talk like it was the best time in their life. It was crucial for these displays to go back up. That’s when I realized Christmas lights are a part of our lives.’’
It also was sad for Bryan to witness the decline and demise of neighborhood holiday light displays. Remember the traffic jams to see the residential lights on Glen Hill Court off Forest Hill Road and Capitol Avenue off Houston Avenue?
“I would load up my kids and drive around,’’ Bryan said. “One year we had driven around for an hour and only found two houses that were really decorated. I thought: ‘People are losing it!’ ’’
He knew folks would drive great distances to experience the magic of lights in places like Callaway Gardens in Pine Mountain. His idea was not just to string up a few pretty lights but to make downtown a yuletide destination.
“I wanted something that was going to be on the next level and that people would drive to see because it was not the same as everywhere else,’’ he said.
He told those willing to fund the project that, instead of paying someone to put up the lights, let him volunteer and use the money to buy … more lights.
“You can’t just go on Amazon and get 10,000 boxes of Christmas lights,’’ he said. “They come from China and they are only manufactured a certain time of year. People order in May and (the lights) come over on a slow boat. Lowe’s orders certain amounts for certain stores. There is not a central warehouse for overstock. When it’s gone, it’s gone.’’
In the fall of 2017, he dispatched his mother, Jo Ann Josey, on a special mission to travel to almost every Lowe’s in the state and buy up their inventory of LED holiday lights.
“She would go to all those stores until her car was slammed full in the trunk and back seat,’’ Bryan said.
Last year, he placed an advance order through Lowe’s, and his own container of lights was shipped.
Many nights, Bryan now strolls up and down Poplar, blending with the crowds and doing a little December eve eavesdropping.
“The first year I talked to a lady who was brought from hospice,’’ he said. “She had been going to Callaway her whole life. She sat there and cried and talked about how beautiful it was. Last year, I would see a man every night watching people. I walked over and said, ‘You must love Christmas lights.’ And he said, ‘Well, I lost my wife about three months ago and home is just not the same. But I can come down here, and it just brings me life.’
“You don’t know when you see people where they are at or what is going on in their lives. But, when you watch them down here, it’s like everything is just a big melting pot of happiness, joy, peace and everything the holiday season is supposed to be. You might have two over here who are hurting, but this is bringing healing. And you might have somebody over here who has nothing, but this is something. They can’t go to Callaway. Everybody has a story and there is no way to know what all the stories are. I wish I could be the Santa Claus who is looking down and gets to all the know the impacts of all these things.’’
Ed Grisamore teaches journalism at Stratford Academy in Macon. His column appears on Sundays in The Telegraph.