Del and Priscilla Gendron opened their home to kids and gave gifts for the last time.
LEWISTON – The lights went on every afternoon at 4:30.
While Del Gendron was outside, flicking the seven switches that it took to light the more than 7,000 bulbs, Priscilla Gendron arranged the selection of gifts in the family room.
While Del was walking around the house or climbing on the roof, looking for unlit strands, Priscilla made sure that the dolls were on one side, the remote-control cars on the other and the boxes of crayons, miniature organs and plastic tool sets were evenly dispersed.
Most nights, kids started arriving before the Gendrons had time to sit down.
For nearly 20 years, Del and Priscilla invited children to come to their home during the two weeks before Christmas to pick out a gift. Anyone under 7 was welcome, as indicated on the wooden signs posted on their street and in front of their door: “Come on in kids. 7 and under. Santa stops here.”
‘A lot of work’
Over the years, as word traveled from neighborhood to neighborhood across central and western Maine, the Gendrons started getting more than 200 visitors per season.
It was a tradition the couple enjoyed, almost as much as the wide-eyed kids who walked through their door every night.
But now, at ages 76 and 77, they decided it was time to call it quits.
On Monday, the singing Santa will be put in a box, the lights will come down and the wooden sign that has attracted parents and kids to their home for almost two decades will be put away.
For good.
“It’s going to be sad to let it go,” said Priscilla. “It feels so good to see all the kids, the smiles on their faces when they walk into the room. But it’s a lot of work.”
Checking them twice
Every year, they started getting ready for the following Christmas as soon the lights came down.
“After Christmas, I hit all of the Rite Aids, the CVSs. I bought things at 50 percent off,” Del said. “It was nothing real expensive, but the kids liked it.”
Most years, the couple spent about $2,000. The toys remained in the attic until Thanksgiving, when Del piled them on a bench in the garage, put batteries in the items that required them and checked to make sure everything worked.
Then, two weeks before Christmas, the couple arranged the presents in their family room and left doubles in the garage to replenish the supply.
Beginning at 4:30 p.m., they ate dinner in shifts so that one of them was always in the family room to greet parents and their children at the door. If they had plans or something unexpected came up, such as the funeral for their good friend who died this year, they arranged for one of their five children or 12 grandchildren to be at the house.
See, we’ve been good
Most years, Del made emergency shopping trips to pick up extra fire engines, dolls or military trucks. Every morning, Priscilla spent at least an hour mopping and vacuuming the floors for the next round of kids.
This year’s rain and snow made that a difficult job.
“It was getting to be a chore,” Priscilla said. “I was so tired.”
“I’m 77. We’ve been doing this a long time,” Del added.
Still, making the decision to stop wasn’t easy.
They know that families will be disappointed, and they will miss seeing the children. Despite Del’s dark brown hair, thin posture and smooth chin, he’s been called Santa by the kids at his church. Priscilla is Mrs. Claus, and their home on Ridge Road has become known as the magic house.
Every year, kids brought the Gendrons school pictures and copies of their report cards to show that they’d been nice, not naughty. Many also brought gifts – bottles of perfume, fudge and homemade cookies.
A petite woman with a thick French accent, Priscilla has always loved giving gifts at Christmas time.
“As a Frenchman, Christmas always meant a lot,” she said. “It is quite rewarding.”
A tale of two Barbies
The tradition of buying gifts for strangers started after their own children were grown. Instead of buying individual presents for the young children in the family, the couple bought an array of presents one year and invited all of their nieces and nephews to come over and choose one.
The following year, they told those kids to invite their friends. The year after that, they put out the sign.
They got an average of 200 visitors a year. Aside from the over-7 rule, each child was only allowed to take one gift and they could only make one visit per season.
Occasionally, however, those rules were bent.
This year, Priscilla couldn’t resist offering two Barbies to a girl who nearly cried because she couldn’t decide between the white doll and the black doll. An exception was also made for the 4-year-old who showed up one night with her mother, then got her father to take her the following night without telling him that she had already been.
“We have lots of funny stories, lots of memories” Del said. “It won’t be easy to stop.”
lchmelecki@sunjournal.com
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