Smiling children picking out their favorite decorations, families sipping on hot chocolate and the arrival of Santa Claus all highlighted the kickoff to Jim Thorpe’s inaugural “Festival of Trees” Thursday night in Memorial Park.

Forty trees, located throughout the park and decorated by local residents, families, groups, organizations and clubs, were lit for the first time as over 100 people, young and old, looked on.

“It’s awesome when you see a community come together like this,” Mayor Michael Sofranko said. “This is our first year and there was a huge learning curve, but the community support never wavered. All of these trees have a real personal touch and it will be exciting to be able to come here throughout the holiday season and enjoy them.”

Bernice Goodman brought her grandchildren to Thursday’s tree unveiling and the duo, Alex and Gregory, were thrilled to check out the lights and enjoy a visit with Santa and Frosty the Snowman.

“I think the park looks beautiful,” Goodman said. “It’s nice to have something over on this end of town for the kids and the families to come see. When you see all the trees lit up like this, it really does make you say wow.”

A committee within Jim Thorpe had been hoping to plan the event several years ago but, like it did for many things, the COVID-19 pandemic had different plans. It was put on the back burner until 2022, when the group was able to secure 4-foot trees from Walker Tree Farm in Lehighton and offer them for $45 each.

Sofranko said the goal of the event was to start small and build up over future years. The plan paid off, he said, as trees were especially hard to come by this year.

“There was a lot of interest and we could have probably easily sold another 15 or 20 more by the end of the week, but I think it worked out great for our first year,” he said.

Hot dogs and hot chocolate were made available for purchase and no holiday event would be complete without a visit from Santa, who was driven to the park by Police Chief Joe Schatz.

“He was very nice to me,” 5-year-old Jason Wolfe said of Santa. “I got to have my picture taken with him.”

Thursday’s event couldn’t have come together, Sofranko said, without the help of the entire community, including one particular business owner.

“A special thank you has to go out to Shawn Kresge, who came and helped us get everything up and running,” he said. “We’re thankful he did because Borough Councilman Mike Yeastedt and I were up here blowing fuses every day trying to light the trees up.”

Borough President Greg Strubinger said he considered the event a huge success and hopes for an even bigger and brighter Festival of Trees in future years.

“I’m really thinking this is going to become Jim Thorpe’s newest tradition and I certainly hope that’s the case,” he said. “We had great success tonight and the weather was even somewhat in our favor. We had a windy day and it seemed to calm down just in time to enjoy the night.”

The trees will stay up in Memorial Park until Jan. 7.

The Festival of Trees committee includes Sofranko, Lombardo-Schatz, Joe Schatz, Rose and Greg Strubinger, Mike Yeastedt, Joanne Klitsch, Betty Lou McBride and Ted and Lori LaRizzio.