Carrying bundles of gifts, Santa Train rolls through the Mountain Empire

BY DEBRA McCOWN
BRISTOL HERALD COURIER
ST. PAUL, Va. – When the Santa Train rolled into town Saturday, the Jolly Elf in the red suit and Wynonna Judd weren’t the only special guests.

Also aboard was John H. Puckett, a 70-year-old former railroad worker who for many years was tasked with loading the Santa Train before its traditional Appalachian run.

On Saturday, Puckett watched the thousands of Santa Train fans along the 110-mile route from the inside, thanks to a few written words from his daughter, Lesa Stapleton, who won an essay contest for the ride.

“This is something he always wanted to do, but he never thought he would have an opportunity,” Stapleton said of her father, who started working for the railroad at age 17.
“And I am on top of the world because I was able to write this essay and give him a chance to ride it,” she said. “So this was the best Christmas present I could ever have.”

Stapleton wrote one of two winning essays that landed rides for her father and for Thomas Sargent, 81, who took his family to see the train every year for more than half a century.

“We have received over 70 essays, and some of those essays made me cry,” said Marybeth Kench, communications and events coordinator for the Kingsport Area Chamber of Commerce, one of the sponsors of the Santa Train. “If it was up to me I’d just throw two more cars on the train and let everybody ride.”

Stapleton said her father, in the years he worked in Kingsport loading the train, always talked riding it one day.
“I think it’s the most wonderful thing there ever was because it gave kids an opportunity to see Santa Claus and have Christmas presents, which otherwise some of them may not have had that opportunity,” Puckett said of the Santa Train.

Memories along the tracks Shirley Carlson, 55, remembers getting candy from the train as it passed her home in the community of Sun, near Dante, Va., where her father worked for the railroad. He would always call, Carlson said, to let the family know when the train was almost there.
“I did this all those years growing up, and this is my grandson,” Carlson, now of Abingdon, said, referring to her 9-year-old grandson Colton Phillips, of Bristol, who was with her Saturday to meet the train in St. Paul.

“I started it when I was 3, looking out the window watching the train go by, watching all my brothers and sisters pick up the candy because I wasn’t old enough,” she said. “I grew up with it and took my children, and now here’s the next generation.”

There were hundreds waiting in St. Paul for the train’s arrival Saturday – and for the distribution of some of the 15 tons of gifts, candy, snacks, new toys and clothing thrown or handed from the train when it stops. Beginning at 6:30 a.m. at Shelby, Ky., the train made 12 stops before delivering Santa to Kingsport, Tenn., for an afternoon parade.

The train is sponsored by CSX, Food City and the Kingsport Area Chamber of Commerce.

“It started back in 1943, basically as a way for the Kingsport businessmen to thank their patrons in Virginia and Kentucky,” Kench said.

“Back in the ’40s they used to have passenger trains, and they would bring people from Virginia and Kentucky into Kingsport on a passenger train, and they would shop and they would go back.”

Andrea Seal, of Front Royal, Va., drove seven hours and stayed with family in Southwest Virginia so her children could see the Santa Train, which she remembers from her childhood in Haysi.

She and relatives stood with garbage bags full of candy, snacks, toys and rolls of wrapping paper collected from the train and from a Food City trailer that distributed more items after the train’s departure.
Her kids might not eat all the food they’d collected, she admitted; but “we have a lot of family that need it.”
Her mother, Linda Schmidt, of Dickenson County, also remembers meeting the train in Haysi as a child.
The youngest of 14 children raised in a two-bedroom house along with two cousins, she remembers hard economic times.

Back then people raised much of their food, Schmidt said, and, with the current recession, it’s again come to the point where some children will likely get their only Christmas presents from the Santa Train.
“Now that the economics are bad again, with the coal mines closing, it’s back almost like when I was younger,” Schmidt said. “The economy has gone backwards.”

Regional tradition

St. Paul Mayor Kyle Fletcher, who remembers coming to see the Santa Train from the time it began, said it’s never been about the gifts so much as the magic of seeing Santa Claus roll into this railroad town on an impressive ride.

The engineer, too, was always a hero, Fletcher said, because “he drives that thing.”

“The thing about the Santa Train is it’s the beginning of Christmas,” Fletcher said. “That’s a tradition that’s been in this part of the country for along time. When the Santa Train comes, we know the real thing is not too far behind. There’s just as much excitement today as there ever was.”

While it’s hard to find anyone on the Saturday before Thanksgiving who doesn’t like the Santa Train, some who remember the old days contend it’s become too commercialized – and has lost some of its holiday spirit.

“It seems to me [years ago] the adults stepped back a little distance,” said Stacy Martin, who brought his children Saturday, more than 20 years after he saw the Santa Train as a child. “But now it seems more like a basketball game where everybody jumps.”

Martin said it should be about the kids – and adults letting them see Santa and collect gifts rather than jostling themselves for position to grab the items thrown from the train.

As the train pulled out Saturday, Martin’s 9-year-old daughter Kiyla was crying because she couldn’t see Santa.

Chloe Meade, who brought her 7-year-old grandson Brennan from Honaker to see the train, said the adults should be made to let the children stand in front.

Moreover, she said, “The parents should know to put the kids in front.”

Carlson said the commercialization has robbed the event of some of its genuine nature. “There were folks who had very little,” she said, “and having this event really meant they’d have something for Christmas.”

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