Drowning the darkness: Horry County community hopes Christmas lights change perceptions
About 30 white bags with lights dotted Hatti Williams’ yard and gave the otherwise empty field next to her home a heavenly glow. Moving the makeshift lights from her kitchen to the yard was the project she tackled the other day.
The next day she tackled another project, adding more and more Christmas decorations to a yard that is never really finished.
“I put a little bit there, a little bit the next day,” Williams said, “day by day.”
At 81-years-old, soon to be 82, Williams covers her own house with a holiday display that would make Clark Griswold blush. Sure she wishes she could have some help, and she puts up fewer than she did in years past. Neither stops her.
Williams talked about the inflatable snowman she put one day. Some lights around a tree on another. She even bought new light bulbs to replace the burned-out ones in some decorations to give them a second-life.
Donning a red Santa hat, Williams moves throughout her yard with the spring in her step reminiscent of a child visiting Kris Kringle at a department store to show off her various displays. The crispness in the air added to the Christmas feel, though it meant the 81-year-old needed her heavy, black coat to protect from the frigid temps.
Someone then asked about a picture in her front yard. Williams whipped off the coat to reveal a bright green, Elf costume.
The others in her yard could only laugh and heckle her as they wondered why she kept it hidden under the coat. The moment was a perfect metaphor for what Williams and others neighborhood are trying to accomplish. To remove the darkness and let the line shine.
That neighborhood is Freemont.
Light in the darkness
The residents of Freemont love their neighborhood but are slow to talk to outsiders. The homes might not be the mansions or prefab residences that line Highway 9 nearby, the mostly Black community takes pride in Freemont.
They are now using the holiday season and Christmas lights to shed light on their neighborhood by decorating their houses to let people know the perception isn’t always true.
“Our community has been on the news for being very sad,” said Cynthia Gore, who has lived in Freemont for more than 50 years. “We want to put out lights to brighten it up to show we have a good community.
“And we can do good things as a community.”
Gore said she was sitting in church a couple of weeks ago as the preacher talked about coming out of the darkness and into the light. She returned home and looked at a Christmas program. She thought about trying to light up Freemont and put her idea on social media in the morning.
“I just put it on Facebook one morning, ‘Let’s light up Freemont, Longs,’” Gore said. “Somebody shared it before I could take it off, so I decided to go with it. Let’s light up Longs because I know we can do it.”
It didn’t take long to get others on board with the plan to hang lights on the homes throughout the neighborhood. Williams, who decorates every year anyway, was easy to get on board.
“I love it. It’s great,” Williams said with a smile as bright as the lights in her yard. “I love Christmas. That is my time of the year.”
Keeping the Christmas spirit
Several houses have joined Williams and Gore in the “Light Up Freemont” Campaign. Some covered their porches, trampolines and trees in Christmas lights. One house had familiar Christmas tunes playing along with its light show. Others had a single tree wrapped in light, but even that was a big deal for the community often shaded by darkness, figuratively and sometimes literally as it as few street lights.
“I bought so many lights I never have to buy another light,” Gore said. “Everybody’s done good. Go Freemont!”
Even Santa will be impressed when he comes through on Christmas Eve and sees Freemont awash in Capraesque lights.
“Him and his reindeer will probably just stop and stare,” Gore said.
Since the campaign started, Gore said she drove around to take pictures of the homes and posted them on social media. She proudly shows off the posts and videos she has shared of the houses.
That has caused issues as residents jokingly call Gore to ask why their house hasn’t been featured yet.
The hope is to organize a community walk so people could gather to look at the lights, residents said. They also want the county to know they can come and see the decorations.
“We decided to drown the darkness out of our community by putting up Christmas lights,” Gore said.
Though that darkness, that perception, still catches even the longtime residents. One of Williams’ decorations are arches covered in blue lights that line her corner of Williamson and Freemont roads. Gore admitted that the sight, reminiscent of the lights of a police car, has caused her to pause.
“It got me,” she said with a laugh.
The dream is the light campaign can help change those perceptions and entrenched assumptions. To let people know there is more to Freemont than just what they heard.
“There are some good people in this community,” Gore said. “We have a good community. It’s not everybody. We want everyone to know we got some good human beings in Freemont.”
Jazmin Bellamy attends college but grew up in Freemont and was back for the holiday season.
Horry County should know that Freemont, and Longs as a whole, is not just what they see on the news, Bellamy said. The event has helped people connect in Freemont, Bellamy said, as neighbors gather and talk about the campaign.
She said the lights can have the biggest impact on children in the neighborhood. It lets them know they are not alone and even if they feel that way, the neighborhood has their back.
“Just riding around, you see Christmas lights, it brings joy or that instant warming feeling,” Bellamy said.
Organizers want “Light up Freemont” to become an annual tradition or spur other decorating events to mark the holiday. They want the spirit felt in neighborhood during this Christmas season to continue throughout the year.
“As a community, with love in your heart, it can go on and on all year long,” Gore said. “You don’t have to stop it right here at Christmas. It can go every day. It’s not just Christmas. It’s an everyday thing when you got love in your heart.”
“It’s an everyday thing. All year long. 365 days.”
