Yuletide memories

12/25/05

COMMENTARY, Robert Allbright

I have lived in Santa Barbara for the past 72 years. I remember when I lived at our first house, at 1115 San Andres St., there was a large avocado tree next to us on a vacant lot. Lane's Grocery was on the corner of San Andres and Anapamu streets. We celebrated Christmas each of the years I lived in that house -- 1933-1940.

We moved to 2027 Gillespie St. for one year after selling our house on San Andres Street because we were building a new home at 829 W. Mission St. By the way, I still have the original plans to this house, since 1940.

During the years as a youngster, mother took me to the Children's Shop every year at Christmastime. I was amazed by the mechanical Santa in that store -- especially when he knew me by name. It took me a long time to figure out how he knew my name.

One time I tried sneaking by him, crawling on the floor thinking he wouldn't see me. That did not work. You could never fool Santa. He said to me: "What's the matter, Bobby, aren't you going to come and say hello to Santa today?"

After that, I gave up trying to sneak by him. He outsmarted me every time.

I enjoyed that little Santa for years until the Children's Shop became a morphology, developing into the newer downtown stores. I declare, if he could be found again he would bring a large percentage of business to every store that had him. If he could ever be found again somewhere, I suggest that the various downtown stores share him from store to store. He was always a great business gatherer for the Children's Shop.

After we moved into our new, all-redwood home on West Mission Street, we were still using the older Christmas tree lights; if one burned out, the rest went dark. The only way I could ever figure out which bulb had burned out was to take each bulb off the line and replace new bulbs on the entire line. Then, start placing the old, fancy bulbs back, one by one, until I found which bulb was burned out.

There were special bulbs during those days of the 1930s to 1940s, like clowns, Santas, Christmas bells and all sorts of nonedible fruits. To this day, I bring out what I have left of these old lights and light them up just to bring back memories of yesteryear.

My father worked for the telephone company for 27 years before retiring in 1949. I don't know how my father could ever figure out which bulb was bad, but he had a special talent of finding it the first time.

I could never figure out how Santa was going to come down the chimney because we had a fake fireplace. During those days, there were gas jets in each room of the house, and there was a gas jet at the rear of the fake fireplace that we used for the main heater in the living room.

After we moved into our new home, World War II broke out and there became shortages -- including metal Christmas ornaments. We went to Newberrys and bought all-glass ornaments that were just as pretty but more delicate.

The author lives in Santa Barbara.