The Last Christmas Show

The world was still innocent, but that would be changing.

It was cold that day, I remember. A heavy snow had fallen the night before, and the sidewalk in front of the theater had been shoveled but was slick with ice. The roads had been plowed, and the snow heaped up in front of the old theater like a fortress wall protecting us from the world.

I was with my cousins, and the future was far away and in most cases, not even on the horizon. My oldest cousin was still just a kid in junior high. Inside of ten years he’d be waist deep in a green hell called Vietnam. I had no idea I’d strap on six gun and pin on a badge, or go to war myself in a dustbowl called Iraq. Or that my son would follow after me years later.

The idea of making ends meet, wars, children of my own, and carrying relatives and friends to the grave was as remote as the furthest stars. But when you’re seven years old, things like that just don’t register.

Today, our biggest concern was the here and now. In minutes the theater doors would open, and half the kids in the county would push in for our yearly Christmas treat. We’d sit and watch movies while our parents shopped.

“This is the last one,” I heard a cousin say. “Old Man Gumper is selling the place.”

I knew who Mr. Gumper was. He owned the local Gambles store. And I’d just learned he owned the theater and that he was selling it. Somehow, the idea didn’t register with me.

The theater in La Jara, Colorado had been closed as long as I could remember. When we moved west of La Jara, we’d come into town about every other week and buy groceries. One of the highlights of the month would happen just in front of the closed up theater. Once a month on a Saturday, the local grocery store had a giveaway. When you bought groceries from them, they gave you so many blank tickets. You put your name and phone number on them. On that Saturday, the market owners came out with a big drum on back of a pickup. You’d hand the tickets to them, and your tickets would join the hundreds of tickets handed up by others in the drum. The drum would turn, a ticket drawn out, and someone would win a fifty dollar shopping spree at the store. Doesn’t sound like a lot of money today, but back then, fifty dollars was a good sum of money.

I remember standing there with my parents, willing and praying for one of of our tickets to be drawn. In all fairness, I had no idea that winning it was like winning the lottery. It meant the difference between beans and rice for supper, and having hamburger and ice cream instead.

As many times as we went, and as many times as the drum turned, our tickets never came out.

But I remembered looking up at the marquee without letters in it. It was always dark. The small boxes that would have held movie posters were always empty. No one stood in front of the dark ticket office to sell tickets.

I couldn’t understand why such a magical place as the theater was closed.

Mr. Gumper still ran the drive-in north of town and would for a number of years. I’d see such classics as the Green Beret, and Smoky there. And I’d be introduced to pizza at that drive in. One of my classmates mother made the pizza there and it was legendary. She also worked as a cook at our High School, and when they made pizza for school lunch, you made sure to have a dime so you could buy another slice.

But all that was in the future. Today, we stood on the icy sidewalk and waited.

The idea behind this yearly festivity was simple. The local business owners in town had gotten together and tried to figure out a way to help keep the Christmas shoppers in town. Instead of mom and dad trekking to Alamosa and spending their money at megastores like Woolworth’s or Montgomery Wards, why not give them a reason to buy here.

The reasoning was if they (the local merchants) provided a baby sitter for a few hours, maybe the dollars would stay local. It was a desperate gamble and it didn’t pay off.

It would be years before I realized that. Today, we stood in the cold and waited for Santa Claus.

Soon, we were rewarded. We heard a police siren and the town cop came up the road with his lights on. Right behind him, and with it’s emergency lights flashing, was the fire truck. And hanging onto the side of the truck, wearing Christmas red, his face covered with a white beard, was old Saint Nick.

Volunteer firefighters and members of local clubs walked escort along the sides. They were there to intercept any child overcome with joy should they rush out towards the truck.

Now, this is what we’d come to see!

Santa was laughing and calling out to everyone. From a red bucket, he tossed penny candies to the crowd of children. It was absolute bedlam. Kids were cheering and waving, the sirens were screaming, and the lights were flashing. Some enterprising citizen turned on the lights that stretched across the street, and it was Christmas in wonderland.

Slowly the fire truck with it’s police escort inched down the street until it was right in front of the old theater. It stopped and Santa stepped lightly from the truck. He slid a little as his booted feet found the icy road. But Santa kept his feet under him and walked across the street, and over the plowed drift. He tussled a couple of heads, and then pulled a key from his pocket.

Flourishing it like someone might a sword, he held the key up for all to see, and then with a laugh, opened the theater.

“Come in. Come in,” his deep voice boomed down the street. “Take your time. No pushing or shoving.”

The doors opened and we went into the theater. Inside were groups of men and women guiding us to our seats. Within a half hour, every seat in the place had a kid in it.

When the theater was full, Santa came out, and asked “Are you ready for some movies?”

He was almost knocked over by the ocean of children shouting back, “Yes.”

“Well, boys and girls. Enjoy and Merry Christmas!”

The lights dimmed, and there was a hiss over the speakers. As the curtains that hide the big screen parted, the familiar tune for the Road Runner started. For the next several minutes we saw Wiley Coyote thwarted at every turn by the cagey bird. Woody Woodpecker was next and followed by Mickey’s Christmas Carol. There were a few more cartoons, then the main feature started. This was a movie, not a cartoon. A biplane soared over a river somewhere, and a man stepped out on the wing of the plane, He dived cleanly into the river. He came up and swam for shore. It was Tarzan and we sat enraptured as he fought lions, crocodiles, and bad guys in Africa.

For hours we sat and cheered, and laughed, and applauded our heroes.

But after several hours, the last frame of film went through the old projector. The lights came on and Santa told us it was time to go home. He told us, there were special presents waiting for us as we left.

In the lobby, the fireman, police, and several men handed out brown paper bags containing candy. It was mostly hard candy. Some of it was ribbon candy, and what as I child, I called “church candy” because some of them had a small crosses in the middle.

I still recall the candy with fondness. My grandfather ran a small store in Costilla, New Mexico and I remember him getting in boxes of the “Church Candy.” He’d spend hours weighing the candy out into plastic bags to sell while Christmas music blared from an old radio.

Mixed in with the church candy was rolled toffees and a very generous helping of nuts and an orange. It never occurred to me that for some of the kids receiving these bags, this is the only candy they would see for the holiday season.

We got our bags, left the theater and found our parents.

And when Max Gumper locked the door for the last time, part of our childhood got locked away with the now darkened screen.

Mr. Gumper did sell the place to Mr. Washeck. He removed the seats and leveled out the gently slopping floor. He put his appliance repair business in the place where we’d sat and watched movies. The lobby became a laundromat.

Years later I asked Mr. Washeck’s daughter, Becky if the screen was till there. She said it was, along with the drapes that had closed in front of it. She thought the projectors were still upstairs.

I haven’t driven by the old theater in years. I don’t even recall the name of it.

But when I think of that Christmas show, I always smile.