Marshall, TX

Marshall's Wonderland of Lights

It’s been almost 15 years since the editor of The Marshall News Messenger took a photo of the Harrison County Courthouse and dotted it with White-Out to show town leaders his dream of decorating every building, tree, and bush in downtown Marshall, Texas, (pop. 23,935) with tiny white Christmas lights.

Back then townsfolk called George Smith crazy. Today, they call him a visionary.

Smith, now a public relations executive in Arkansas, had written numerous unheeded editorials and campaigned with no success to skeptical oil-busted business owners about his lighting fantasy. Then, top fashion model Wendy Russell Reves, a Marshall native living 5,000 miles away in Paris—the City of Lights—responded to Smith’s challenge with a $25,000 check to launch one of the world’s largest annual holiday light shows.

Nearly 9 million light bulbs and 750,000 annual visitors later, Marshall’s Wonderland of Lights is arguably the largest community holiday display in the world—complete with parades, surrey rides, outdoor ice skating, a living Christmas tree, nightly choral performances, and finale fireworks. Planners and volunteers are working to ensure the festival doesn’t dim with age.

“We want to bring back the magic of when we first started this event,’’ says George Carter, a longtime volunteer and chair of this year’s “Revitalize the Lights” festival. “We’ve had our challenges to keep everything going, but this is the kind of town that works even harder when the chips are down.”

Volunteers were dealt a painful blow last year when Harrison County voters failed to pass a bond referendum to restore the historic century-old county courthouse museum, the “crown jewel” of the Wonderland of Lights. The county padlocked the courthouse doors, but allowed the festival to continue decorating the outside.

The courthouse isn’t the only thing aging. The average age of volunteers is moving upward, so the festival is now actively recruiting a new generation of volunteers. Except for lighting the courthouse itself—which requires professional electricians and laborers—volunteers are completely responsible for hoisting light strings on buildings and homes, creating massive holiday panels, staffing information booths, and hosting bus and candlelight tours.

One younger volunteer is Walt Gaines, a 19-year-old who was just 12 when he first started volunteering with relatives staffing vending carts that line the town square. His grandfather was a step-on guide—a volunteer who literally steps onto tour buses coming from Dallas, Shreveport, and other places—and Gaines enjoyed going along. After a couple of years, the youth got his own bus.

“When I first started working at the carts, visitors would talk to me about how impressed they were with a community the size of Marshall doing something as spectacular as this,” Gaines says. “From that moment, I decided to always be a part of helping make every visitor enjoy seeing our hometown.” Now away at college, he’s returned this Christmas to lead tours.

Honey Best, 67, is not quite ready to retire, but wants younger folks to “step-on” up and work with her and 30 other guides.

“When I saw those lights the very first time, I was flabbergasted and couldn’t wait to show it off to others,” says Best, who’s become a tour favorite over the years for her colorful anecdotes and festive costumes in the fashion of Minnie Pearl. “As a step-on guide you have to be a director of signals, answer questions, and provide a little history about our town.” Best often leads a couple of two-hour tours each night during the festival’s peak and by the end of the event, she’ll complete more than 50 tours.

Volunteers start work in mid-October, getting ready for tours, stringing up lights, and installing the outdoor ice skating rink.

The holidays would be a little dimmer without the volunteers in Marshall.

Wade Hyde is a freelance writer in Dallas, Texas.

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