SALT LAKE CITY — Ryan Wheelwright and his family turned on their Christmas light display on Thanksgiving evening — a 30-plus-year tradition.
Wheelwright started working on the 45,000-light exhibit in October. It’s a passion project he inherited from his dad.
“The nostalgia to it is amazing. … My dad started doing (the light exhibit) in the late ’80s,” Wheelwright said. “When I was a kid, like 8 years old, there was like a three hour wait to get into our driveway.”
In 2012, Wheelwright got a call from his dad after he decided to retire from the project. “He asked if any of us wanted to have it,” Wheelwright said.
Wheelwright and his wife, Tish Wheelwright, rented a U-Haul and drove to California, where they picked it up and brought it back to Utah. They’ve carried on with the tradition ever since.
“I added my own spice to it, and away we went,” Ryan Wheelwright said.
“It’s so much work; he’s working on it throughout the entire year,” Tish Wheelwright said. “We were looking at pictures from just four years ago, and we have added so many things. We love it.”
The Wheelwright’s children are especially fond of the floating display featuring Santa and his reindeer. “The first time they flew was in 1995,” Ryan Wheelwright said.
Recent additions include a giant snow globe with a Christmas animation illuminating the inside and a 10-foot-tall LED snowman.
“My daughter always asked about wanting to keep the lights going. She is the one that gave me the inspiration for the snowman,” Ryan Wheelwright said.
Wheelwright’s children, including 10-year-old Derek Wheelwright, said they’d like to keep the tradition going when they grow up too. “I had the idea of the scavenger hunt,” Derek Wheelwright said.
The Wheelwrights said their favorite part of the tradition is sharing the Christmas spirit with friends and strangers who stop by, sometimes by the dozens.
“The service part of it (is my favorite). People are willing to get out and do things with one another,” Ryan Wheelwright said. “Seeing the little kids come out and pointing at things and excited to see the lights and the joy it brings to families. That’s what it’s about.”
The Wheelwrights’ display will be lit every evening until the first week of January from 5:30 to 10 p.m. It is located in Bountiful on 175 West, between 1600 North and 1450 North. On Dec. 14, Santa will stop by from 6-8 p.m., to share treats with visitors.
Visitors can also contribute to help a family friend who is fighting cancer. Donations can be made on site.
The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.
