The vintage Christmas displays from Akron’s Polsky and O’Neil’s department stores and Chapel Hill Mall, on display at Lock 3, have been joined by a new addition: figures from Nela Park in East Cleveland, which this year distributed much of its decor throughout the region after a century of installations.
Savant Systems Inc., the owner of GE Lighting — based in Nela Park — left a message at Lock 3 telling city officials they could pick up what they wanted from the historic displays, said Leah Muhlheim, a recreation supervisor at Lock 3 who went to look at the offerings.
Two box truck loads and an overstuffed carload later, the city now has dozens of pieces to add to its holiday displays, from a large, lit picture frame to the 2005 tree topper for the National Christmas Tree, a blue and white snowflake that has a twin that is going to the Smithsonian.
“I crammed an improbable amount of smaller things into my car,” said Muhlheim, who added that she’d done the same with the box truck. “I wanted everything. I was very excited.”
The poinsettia picture frame was the item she wanted most on the return trip, but it barely fit in the truck, Muhlheim said. She was at first denied the tree topper, in Lock 3 colors, because it was part of a series of the annual tree toppers that was destined for Washington, D.C. But she found its replica in a back room.
“I’m just so incredibly tickled that the beautiful snowflake tree topper, one of them is in the Smithsonian and the only other one I know of is here in Akron,” she said.
Muhlheim said she hadn’t heard of Nela Park before the call came, but the new displays will make a difference downtown.
“We got some good stuff,” said Chris Griffith, the downtown operations manager for the City of Akron. “We were able to add a lot.”
An immediate upgrade to Lock 3
Akron got a call because some of the technicians who helped build the displays, designed by Debbie George, are from the city, Muhlheim said. Some of the Nela Park pieces — like a gingerbread house and a painted, lit-up penguin — are already on display outside at Lock 3 and in a city-run display of other Christmas decorations collected over the years.
Others, like the tree topper, a seal and a gnome, are not yet on display. Many of the pieces are wooden, with lights placed in holes, and some need to be touched up or have bulbs replaced before they’re ready to be seen.
(Susan Zake / Signal Akron)
“They don’t make these anymore,” Griffith said, marveling over some of the handiwork. “All that solid wood. It’s good quality stuff.”
Muhlheim said she’s not yet sure where all the materials she collected will go, but she’d like to return to get more of them. She meant to get another snowman and another penguin, but they didn’t fit in the truck.
“Oh God, I want to go back. I want to go back so much,” she said. “I’ll have one of these and one of these and I’ll take this, and this.”
A blue, green and white gnome, with snowflakes, was another favorite that has yet to be placed, she said, since it matches the Lock 3 color and decorating scheme. Muhlheim said she would not have had the time or budget to create the work that already fits so seamlessly into the park.
“There are so many more beautiful pieces,” she said. “It was like an immediate upgrade to the things that Lock 3 had.”
Adding Nela Park pieces to Akron’s holiday collection
It was mid-November when Griffith learned the city could take some of the displays, and Thanksgiving week when Muhlheim and another worker went to pick things up. It’s possible the city will ask for more pieces, beyond the ice skaters, reindeer, trees, stars and other decorations that have already helped to light downtown.
With a collection that already included department store scenes from The Wizard of Oz and Peter Pan; an enormous Raggedy Ann doll; the elves and penguins from Chapel Hill Mall; and plenty of other nostalgic, Akron-specific holiday decorations, the Nela Park additions fit right in.
“You’ll see people walking though here, talking about their childhood,” Griffith said. “We have a large collection of history.”
That history is the purview of Jeanne Tassiello, the communications manager for Akron’s Lock 3 Park. In past years, Tassiello put up the displays in the windows of the former downtown department stores and other vacant spaces. Then, she said, she measured her success in the number of fingerprints and noseprints on the glass windows as children peered in to see the magic.
For the past three years, Tassiello has put the scenes in a room in the O’Neil building, adjacent to Lock 3, where people can walk through and see the city’s history.
Some Nela Park pieces have already been added to her presentations.
“It’s gotten to where people start knowing, if you have things, make them part of our history,” she said. “Don’t throw them away, don’t sell them. It’s how it got saved: they kept it.”
A foundation to restore displays permanently
The displays are owned and maintained by the city and the Downtown Akron Partnership and include everything from 1962 snow babies designed for O’Neil’s by Harold Gale to motorized Cabbage Patch Kids surrounding an oversized shoe.
Many of the pieces move — or would move, if their motors weren’t decades old, Tassiello said.
“I could plug in Captain Hook, but I’m scared to leave him,” she said. “They’re made out of plaster, papier mache. They weren’t meant to be around more than a year.”
She’s restored some pieces, and become adept at hiding broken hands, but she’d like to start a foundation for a more permanent restoration solution — and, perhaps, a mechanism to keep the pieces visible year-round, in windowed containers. That would help ensure generations of residents will be free to reminisce about the displays for years to come.
The ability to visit the displays they grew up with is meaningful to people, Tassiello said, allowing them to connect with the memories of the people they saw them with then.
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A passion for Akron history
Archie, the talking snowman formerly at Chapel Hill Mall, remains a huge draw, Griffith said. He said an Archie Fan Club day at Lock 3 on Dec. 20 brought the largest number of visitors to the park this season, behind only the holiday parade and tree lighting kickoff event on Black Friday.
“People are passionate about their Akron history,” Griffith said.
He said he’s used to seeing people walking through the park and displays, talking about their childhood. The Nela Park additions will give more entry points for people to remember holidays past and more opportunities to decorate the area. Muhlheim said she hopes she can add plaques in the future to tell people what the decorations are and where they came from.
“That stuff is expensive, and they didn’t make it cheap,” Griffith said. “To add it to our collection is pretty cool.”
Tassiello said she appreciates that while Savant Systems could have made money selling off Nela Park’s displays, they elected to donate the pieces.
“They didn’t want anything except to see what we could use,” Tassiello said. “It’s about somehow keeping their tradition alive, too.”
If you go to see the displays at Lock 3
The old department store displays are in the basement of the O’Neil building on the north side, in a room across from Akron Children’s Museum, near the Lock 3 ice skating rink. The hours of the display match the hours of the ice rink. The pieces will be on display through Feb. 16.
What Akron collected from Nela Park
On display:
- Gingerbread house with candies, lollipops and candy canes; in the holiday display inside
- Large picture frame photo op with poinsettia; in the holiday display inside
- Painted light up penguin with presents; near Archie
- Painted light up snowman; near Archie
- Three large ice skating figures, inside the Commons
- One child ice skater figure; near Archie
- Two reindeer figures; inside the holiday display
- Five large white cubes with twinkling blue snowflakes; near Lock 4
Not on display (yet):
- Seven triangle trees with twinkly blue snowflakes
- Painted light up seal
- One light tapestry 30-foot snowman
- One light tapestry 30-foot gnome
- 24 crystal-look tree toppers
- Five point white stars in various sizes
- Glitter gold 3D star ornaments
- White and blue glitter snowflake ornaments
- Red and white star ornaments
- Blue and green jumbo ornaments
- Blue and green sphere ornaments
- 2005 national tree topper, blue and white snowflake; the twin is going to the Smithsonian