Monday, December 14, 2009
Deceased deer pulled Santa's sleigh at Crossroads
Tom Angleberger
The New River Valley-based reporter answers your questions Mondays in his column, What's on Your Mind?
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I was ready to cancel Christmas ... or at least the Christmas theme for this week's column. But readers came through like Rudolph on a foggy Christmas Eve and supplied the details -- and a few pictures -- we wanted about Crossroads Mall Christmas displays of yore.
Yes, Virginia, the reindeer were dead.
"I recall the reindeer were real -- stuffed -- and the display was rather large with some of the reindeer suspended on wires like they were taking off," recalled Valerie Deal Augustine.
Well, I suppose that's one way to make sure they don't run over grandma.
Now to me the idea of taking a kid to the mall to see Rudolph and discovering that he is dead sounds like the nightmare before Christmas. But most of the readers who remembered the spectacle didn't seem to be particularly bothered by it.
Karen Rose, safety coordinator for The Roanoke Times, recalled taking her daughter to see the indoor winter wonderland.
"It really was a beautiful display and we went there every year for Santa photos for several years," she wrote. She even found a few of the pictures. They show a very nice setup with very realistic-looking white-tailed "reindeer."
"I remember as a small boy getting so excited when Santa's exhibit went up at the mall," Thom Brewer wrote. "This was in the days before Tanglewood Mall and Crossroads was the place to shop (and see Santa) in the Valley.
"Santa sat in a sleigh and the deer were posed as if they were taking flight. The smallest deer was close to the mall ceiling and had a red nose, but even as a child I knew they had just stuck a red ball on it."
He wasn't traumatized. In fact he didn't even put two and .22 together at the time.
"It wasn't until years later that I realized that these were once real deer. I came to this discovery when I saw the spots that marked where the deer were shot."
Bullet holes? I asked.
"There wasn't an actual hole, but there was a orange/red spot where there was a hole in the fur."
Rhea Hurt used to work at the mall and offered this behind-the-scenes information:
"When the display was taken down after Christmas, it was put in storage until the next year. One thing I remember about the deer was that their hooves were almost eaten away by mice (or rats) while in storage. When the deer were attached to the sleigh, cotton and fake snow was piled around their feet so the kids couldn't see where the hooves were missing."
Hurt thinks the deer were kept in J.C. Penney's warehouse during the off-season and "were probably disposed of when Penneys moved to Valley View Mall."
***
And now to wrap up the rest of our Ask the Readers Winter Edition:
A reader asked if Roanoke once had a Triangle Park. Come to find out, it still does.
Nelson Harris, the former Roanoke mayor, clued me in: "The Wasena Neighborhood Forum formally petitioned the city to have the small park's name changed to Triangle Park, and on January 22, 2002, the City Council formally changed the name from Oak Park to Triangle Park." The park is bounded by Kerns Avenue, Hamilton Terrace and Oak Park Street.
It's possible the questioner was thinking of an older park. Reader Gordon Peters recalled seeing a sign for "Triangle Park" near the Wasena Bridge in the '50s. Anyone have any information about that?
As for the strange, mill-like building on Virginia 52, that's going to require further investigation.
Another reader wanted soft socks. Two readers suggested a product called World's Softest Socks (1-866-977-SOCK). Another suggested Medi-Peds, available at Kmart.
Got a question? Got an answer? Call Tom Angleberger at 777-6476 or send an e-mail to woym@roanoke.com. Don't forget to provide your full name, its proper spelling and your hometown.
