Nightly light show and Dickens Victorian Village  

Make the Season Bright

by Marilyn Loeser

I love the holidays, but I’ll be truthful — it’s been a long time since I really felt that rush of childhood wonderment.

That is until I visited Cambridge, Ohio, the week of Christmas. My husband and I stood on Wheeling Avenue, just across from the courthouse. We were waiting for the sun to set and the clock to strike 6. The temperature was in the teens, but we waited.

As time inched by, more and more people — families with children, teenagers and organized groups — crowded the sidewalk along the city’s wide thoroughfare.

Then a booming recorded voice announced the “Guernsey County Courthouse Holiday Music and Light Show,” and the fun began. The 1881 courthouse suddenly came to life as thousands of pulsating lights — 33 animated light displays and 15,000 lights outlining the building — danced to synchronized holiday music. The lights are controlled by computer and 300 electrical circuits.

There are three versions of the light show performed every evening from late November to early January. The show lasts about 20 minutes. The impressive visual and audio treat is repeated every 30 minutes until the final production of the evening which starts at 9 p.m., so there are seven chances to catch the extravaganza.

When the show ended, I realized my face had frozen into a smile — a joyous, childlike wonderment smile.

The Dickens Victorian Village

The light show was neither the beginning nor the end of our holiday adventure. Although the courthouse light show premiered in 2008, The Dickens Victorian Village began two years earlier when local businessman and artist Bob Ley envisioned the concept, created sketches of each scene and organized the beginnings of an event committee.

Volunteers built and clothed the mannequins, each dressed in period clothing. The heads and faces were sculpted and painted by members of the Eastern Ohio Art Guild. Local and area organizations, as well as individuals, donated funding, time and materials.

The first year there were 40 scenes of 106 lifelike and life-size figures representing classic scenes of Victorian society; the following year, an additional 37 figures and 19 scenes were added. By 2008, the number of scenes totaled 63 throughout downtown Cambridge.

Dickens’ Victorian scenes are located along Wheeling Avenue at each antique lamppost and bench between 6th and 11th Streets. Scenes in windows on street level and in second-story windows along Wheeling Avenue were added in the 2007 season, depicting indoor activities of the Victorian age such as wrapping gifts or decorating a Christmas tree.

Each display has a short narrative about what visitors are looking at. For example:

Charles Dickens wrote "A Christmas Carol" in roughly six weeks. The Cratchit family was based on his own childhood life, he being the eldest of five siblings. Tiny Tim was representative of all children living in poverty.

The lamplighter, an employee of the town, usually used a wick on a long pole to ignite the gas flame of public street gaslights. In 1834, London had over six hundred miles of gas lines laid in order to feed the street lamps.

Wheeling Avenue features original buildings from the 1800s, the perfect backdrop for the sculptures.

Make sure and stop at The Ye Ole Curiosity Shoppe and Dickens Welcome Center, 643 Wheeling Avenue. Here you’ll get a behind the scenes look at how the village was created.

At the back of the Shoppe is a tea room where costumed hostesses serve light refreshments. And, there’s a large selection of holiday souvenirs for sale.

You can pick up a walking tour brochure at the Shoppe or at local hotels.
New this year is the Sherlock Holmes Weekend, a three-day mystery event set

throughout Cambridge. It will be held Friday, Saturday and Sunday; Jan. 8 through 10, 2010.

Participants will set out to find clues to solve Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Taylor Tontine, written by a local playwright and featuring the Dickens Victorian Village displays.

Forget the mall, the baking and wrapping gifts. For an afternoon or a weekend, just enjoy the holiday spirit in Cambridge — you might find your inner child again.

If you go:

The Guernsey County Courthouse Holiday Music and Light Show runs this year from Saturday, November 21 through Sunday, January 10, 2010 — 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

The Dickens Victorian Village is featured November 1 through Saturday, January 9, 2010.

Cambridge is situated between Columbus, Ohio, and Wheeling, WV, on the I-70 corridor; and between Cleveland and Parkersburg, WV, on the I-77 corridor.

Because of its location, there are several hotels to pick from including the Comfort Inn at 2327 Southgate Parkway, located only five minutes from the heart of the city. For more information check the website: www.comfortinn.com/hotel-cambridge-ohio-OH204.

For more information about holiday events and attractions, hotels and restaurants, check the Guernsey County Visitors & Convention Bureau website at www.visitguernseycounty.com, or call 1-800-933-5480.