H E ’S C O M I N G T O T O W N !
Ho Ho Ho - 94 Years of Rotary Santa
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... the Coronado Rotary Santa program represents the essence of Rotary ...
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| CORONADO MAGAZINE
ow in its 94th year, Coronado Rotary Santas will be returning to Coronado homes on Christmas Eve to deliver presents to local boys and girls. Lew Barnum wrote up the classic story in Coronado Lifestyles Magazine in 2005 of an early 1960s Coronado Rotary Santa delivering a real-life, fourlegged pony to a “shocked, surprised, awestruck, and thrilled” six-year-old boy by the name of Jimmy Cahill. For decades prior to this one-of-a-kind pony delivery tale, and for all the years since then, there have been thousands of stories of children being thrilled on Christmas Eve when Santa and his elves arrive at Coronado homes. Lew Barnum (1937 – 2017) was the driving force of the Coronado Rotary Santa Program for many years. His written description of the program included, “I’ve been a Rotary Santa since I joined the club back in 1973, and now, with my white hair, all I need is the beard. To me, the Coronado Rotary Santa program represents the essence of Rotary: a combination of community service, youth service, and goodwill.” There are more than 35,000 Rotary Clubs in the world, and as far as we know, Coronado is the only club with a Christmas Eve Santa Program deploying multiple Santas and their elves to local residences. There are a number of magazine and newspaper articles that provide a smattering of clues to the origins of the program. The earliest reference is from The Coronado Eagle & Journal, Volume XVII, Number 51, dated December 18, 1929. The Coronado Rotary Club was in only its third year of existence at that time, and the article describes the Rotary Club’s sponsorship of “the beautiful Silver Fir Christmas tree and the Christmas Eve Program” held at Isabella and Orange Avenues, what is now Rotary Park. This article goes on to describe
