December 10, 2006

Many "old timers" fondly remember the first house in Littlefield to begin decorating their yard for the holidays. There were businesses that decorated, but few individual residences had the Christmas spirit or time to the degree required to share it with the whole community. It was located at 900 Duncan Avenue (now 800 East 11^th Street) and belonged to D. W. (Davey Wilburn or Dave) and Faye Holladay. For those of you who never had the pleasure of viewing this amazing (for its day) display, I’m truly sorry.

Many of those same old timers knew Mr. and Mrs. Holladay as Faye and Dave, or Mom and Pop. They moved to Littlefield in the fall of 1929 from Mexia, Texas (pronounced Ma-hay-a) via a two-year stay in Floydada. Dave was transferred by the gas company he worked for. In those days, if you were fortunate enough to have a job and were asked to move to keep it, you did.

The Holladays had four children; Dan Wallace (Dub to everyone), Hazel Marie, Bettye Kate, and Bobby Gene. The children all attended school in Littlefield.

As far as decorating the house goes, at first Mom and Pop outlined the house with blue lights and put Santa and his sleigh with one reindeer on top of the house. Since decorations weren’t common-place at the time, these were all home-made. Faye and Dave’s daughter, Bettye Kate, being "the artist" in the family, was up to the task. She first drew the image of Santa, his sleigh, and the reindeer onto heavy ply-wood. Then her husband, Hollis Smith, carefully cut them out. Fancy saws for this purpose were also hard to come by then, so the wood-working tasks were definitely labors of love, too.

Bettye Kate then painstakingly painted each detail by hand. She had to paint with one color, then let it dry overnight before applying the next. The process took some time and devotion, not to mention a good deal of patience.

They also thought some angels would be nice, so Bettye Kate designed two angels, one for either side of the door. By the time they were finished, each angel held a "candle" made from cardboard tubing, with a white light bulb that looked just like a candle from a distance (to us kids, at least). Of course, these creations would never pass inspection today, but at the time, they were pretty ingenious and eye-catching.

Pop cut a star out of heavy ply-wood and at first covered it with pieces of tin foil that Mom had saved. (Some of you may laugh, but remember, Mom and Pop raised their children during "the Great Depression". Nothing - absolutely NOTHING - was thrown away!) They outlined the star with beautiful blue lights, and hung it in the center of the part of the house we grandkids always thought of as the Alamo. The whole house was outlined in blue lights, as well. Later the star was painted with silver paint, and glitter was sprinkled on it "for effect".

The display gradually expanded with the addition of a family of snowmen singing Christmas carols, and more angels in a group. Soon Rudolph himself joined the group, red nose and all. Lights were added, and added again, though the blue lights on the house always remained the same. The entire concrete fence, from the northeast corner of the extensive yard to the northwest corner, and from there all the way south along the "stair step" fence were lit with multicolored lights, and it was beautiful! You could spot the Holladay house (or Holiday House, if you prefer) from pretty much all over town.

One year Pop decided to put Santa up in a tree. There was a small Mimosa tree on the east side of the house, right in the middle of the yard. There also just happened to be a spare ply-wood "dog" laying around. It seems that Bettye Kate had created a coyote for use on a local July 4^th float. (She says at the time, everyone told her it looked more like a dog than a coyote!)

Pop found a plastic, stuffable Santa somewhere. He stuffed him "plum full" of newspapers, and carefully positioned him in the branches of the tree, just out of reach of dogs. Bettye Kate’s coyote - now a dog - was placed beneath with a tattered piece of red cloth in his mouth. Wouldn’t you know it? Everyone said, "That looks more like a coyote than a dog!" But everyone loved the addition.

Every year letters would be written "to the editor" commenting on the beautiful displays, and thanking the Holladays for sharing their Christmas spirit.

Then kids started stealing light bulbs from around the fence. Pop thought he would thwart the kids by using electrical tape. Each bulb was taped into its socket. When the lights were on, the tape would melt to each bulb, and seal them in. Apparently, this made the little vandals mad. They put firecrackers under the light bulbs and exploded them, destroying the light bulbs and making extraction of the shattered bulbs quite difficult and somewhat risky.

When this started happening, Pop at first thought he’d go ahead and put up the lights the next year, then sit in his truck to try to catch the vandals. After thinking about it, and acknowledging he was not up to it, he said, "No, that’s not what Christmas is all about. I just won’t put them up next year."

Pop passed away before the next Christmas, in September 1971. His kids and their families all got together on Thanksgiving of that year, and put all the lights up one more time, in Pop’s memory, and in honor of Mom. That was the last year the Holladay house was decorated in this memorable fashion.

Nowadays, there are beautiful lights all over town, but many of us remember when the Holladay house was THE place to see "back in the day".