Overly's Country Christmas is a year-round venture for the holidays in Westmoreland County

Workers have been scrambling this week to string lights for the displays spread across the Westmoreland Fairgrounds near Norvelt, unpack countless late-arriving boxes of holiday gifts and shelve them at Overly’s General Store in preparation for Thursday’s opening of Overly’s Country Christmas.

Visitors to the annual show will see many lights strung on fences, buildings, roadways, snowmen sculptures and numerous displays that, if joined end to end, would stretch from the fairgrounds in Mt. Pleasant Township to Mars, said Overly’s executive director Sarah Sphon, who paused for effect before saying she means the Butler County town and not the planet.

Sphon, 28, took over the chief administrative role of the popular traditional event after Stephanie Tomasic, the longtime executive director, died in July 2020. Although new to the top role, Sphon has been volunteering at the event since she was a youngster and is familiar with the tradition. The event, whose proceeds support a variety of area charities, is a family affair for Sphon, whose husband, P.J., is president of the board.

“With our efforts, we’re helping out charities. It’s great to know you are giving back to your community,” Sphon said.

Last year, in the depths of the covid pandemic, people could enjoy the displays only from the comfort of their vehicles. Still, they had a record turnout in terms of carloads of visitors, Sphon said.

The biggest difference visitors will experience this year is that they will be able to get out of their vehicles and walk around the area, enjoy the bonfire, have a bite to eat and shop at C. Edgar & Sons General Store, built by Overly’s Country Christmas founder Harry Overly. Visitors will be able to see a Nativity scene and Santa Claus, eat hot dogs, drink hot chocolate, stand by the bonfire, take a wagon ride pulled by tractor and walk around the displays, Sphon said.

About the only concession to the covid pandemic this year will be that Santa Claus will not have any children sitting on his lap, Sphon said.

“We can’t afford to lose any Santas” to covid, Sphon said.

To pull it off, Sphon said they started working the week after Labor Day and rely on 600 volunteers who work off and on throughout the season. A corps of volunteers is critical.

“We call them the lifetime volunteers. They are here forever and forever,” Sphon said.

The work erecting the displays began in earnest after Halloween, around the time the fairgrounds’ personnel stopped mowing the lawns. Because so much work is involved, Sphon said they still will be adding lights after the opening weekends.

Mindful of the electric bill arising from all those lights burning for all of those hours over the next 1½ months — which can range from $16,000 to $20,000 — Sphon said Overly’s Country Christmas is slowly converting all of the incandescent bulbs to LED lights. The amount of energy used by Henny Hemlock, the talking Christmas Tree, for example, could light 21 homes for a year, Sphon said.

General store

At the general store, chock-full of gift items, the work begins in January when volunteers review what merchandise they want to display 11 months in the future, said Vivian John of Greensburg, a crafter who volunteers in the gift store and sells some of her own merchandise. She became involved 29 years ago when her parents volunteered, and it is a tradition she has handed down to her own children and grandchildren.

They start getting the store ready for the week after Labor Day, once the annual craft show is finished, said Jane Feightner, who coordinates the gift shop operations.

“It’s totally empty” when they start pricing the merchandise, decorating and stocking the shelves two weeks before the Overly’s Country Christmas season begins, Feightner said.

Among the items on display are wooden cutouts of scenes at Overly’s Country Christmas, including the manger, a donkey, the entrance to the light show and a snowman.

“We try to get as much as we can of ‘Made in America,’” Feightner said.

Local crafters are given space to sell their wares, including those who knitted hats and made Pittsburgh Steelers paraphernalia.

The holiday spirit this year was tested by the supply chain nightmares experienced by manufacturers, retailers and shop owners large and small.

“We just (Tuesday) got boxes of gifts that we ordered in January,” Feightner said as she and her fellow volunteers hastily unpacked items, some of which came from overseas.