BUCKHANNON – The James W. Curry Library is bringing early holiday cheer to the southern end of the county with Christmas at Curry.

Director of the James W. Curry Library Judith Williams said this event is a first for the library, but they hope to make it an annual event. The library’s campground will be decorated with lights, and people will be able to tour each site in their vehicles.

“We will be decorating our campground: We have 18 sites in our campground, and we are going to decorate the sites with different light displays and in addition to our core group out here at Curry, we have some people who are going to do their own sites,” Williams said. “We have Kristie Tenney and her family’s doing one site and Mimi Riffle will be doing a site.”

The event will take place Friday, Dec. 11 and Saturday, Dec. 12 and has entry fee of $5 per car.

“The event is beginning at 6 p.m., so you can drive in, and for a $5 entry fee per carload, you can drive through the campground, enjoy the lights and on Saturday evening, weather permitting, we’re also going to have a live nativity scene,” Williams said.

Concessions will be for sale at the pavilion adjacent to the library where they will offer hot chocolate, baked goods, plush animals people stuff themselves and they will be selling handmade dolls.

“We’re also going to be having some pine swag – it’s just a little bundle of pine branches with a lovely bow, something you can hang on your door and it’s something that we can make here from our natural resources,” Williams said. “All the money that we make from the entry fees and concessions will go back into this event to grow it so it can become an annual event that’s family-friendly.”

Williams said the initial idea came about when one of the members of their fundraising committee wanted to put together a light competition between the local fire departments, but that plan never came together.

“This year, it is such a struggle to have anything for Christmas because of COVID, and a lot of people are suffering financially, so we wanted to see what we could do that would be COVID protocol-compliant,” Williams said. “But we still wanted bring some Christmas spirit and community spirit to the neighborhood, to the community, and also something that we can grow, because as finances get more and more difficult as time goes on, we need to be able to support our programming here.”

Williams said they hope people will attend the event, even if they can’t afford to buy anything from the concession stand.

“We separated the event from the concessions so that if you can’t afford to stop by for hot chocolate, we understand, but you can still enjoy the lights for a reasonable fee, and still support the program so we’re just hoping to have a great turnout and hoping the weather will cooperate with us, and we’ll be able to grow this into something really great for the community as time goes by,” Williams said.

Check out the library’s Facebook page here.