Village with yuletide theme growing, thanks to … a casino

Saturday, Dec. 16, 2000 | 10:09 a.m.

He was dreaming of Christmas, a storybook village he would create in the central Upper Peninsula. Where the treetops and icy Lake Superior would glisten, and children would listen as workers made toys in a Santa's workshop come to life.

Alas, his toy factory burned down and Thorson moved to Texas. For the next half-century Christmas would consist of little more than a handful of cottages and trailers, with taverns and stores coming and going.

But nowadays, things are merrier in Christmas. New businesses and houses are being built, and some folks are predicting a tourism boom that would fulfill Thorson's wish for a thriving community.

Only this time, the flagship establishment - the catalyst for much of the new growth - isn't a toy factory.

It's a casino.

The Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians, which opened a small gambling hall in Christmas six years ago, is putting finishing touches on a big expansion. Even before the grand opening, expected next month, the 22,000-square-foot Christmas Kewadin Casino is often crowded as people try their luck at slot machines and blackjack tables.

Would Thorson approve? Bah, humbug, says his former son-in-law.

"He didn't want anything like that," says 82-year-old Louis Passinault. "Gambling has nothing to do with Christmas."

To supporters, the casino is a welcome source of jobs, customers and prospects for growth in a place only 150 or so call home. The village is barely a mile from end to end. State highway 28 runs through it and there is no traffic light.

"It generates a lot of tourist traffic, and that's what we've needed for a long time," says native Rick Carr. He is developing a housing subdivision around a small lake on the western end of Christmas.

Floyd St. Amour, 54, owner of Foggy's Steakhouse and Lounge across the road from the casino, grew up in nearby Munising. Back then, most folks regarded Christmas as just a village with an unusual name, he says.

"Kind of funny that nobody's ever really taken advantage of it, at least 'til now," he says.

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Christmas is nestled in the heart of Michigan's north woods, some 400 miles north of Detroit, where lumberjacks have earned their keep felling maples and other hardwoods since the late 19th Century.

During the Depression, Thorson began buying and selling large tracts in the area, including 40 acres along the Lake Superior shore.

"He wanted to build a Christmas village, a nice family place," Passinault says.

Thorson opened his "Toyland" factory around 1940. It turned out miniature trucks, dolls and other playthings made of scrap wood from a nearby mill. But fire destroyed it less than a year later and Thorson headed south, Passinault says.

Over the years, there were sporadic efforts to revive the yuletide theme.

"For a while we were keeping Christmas decorations up all year, and tourists would stop by to take pictures," says Irma Carr, Rick Carr's mother.

Nov. 1, 1966, was a red-letter day in Christmas, where the U.S. Postal Service had opened a satellite office months earlier. The year's first yuletide stamp was issued there, designed after the Hans Memling painting, "Madonna and Child with Angels."

Since then, the post office has been inundated every fall with requests to place the Christmas postmark on cards, packages and letters to Santa. It has become the village's claim to fame.

"We're Santa Claus - at least we get a lot of mail for him," says Karen Beauchaine, who with husband Joe runs the post office in their convenience store.

In the 1970s, plywood cutouts of Santa and Mrs. Claus, both about three stories high, were placed near the highway. Streets were given names such as St. Nicholas Avenue and Jingle Bell Lane.

Yet such gimmicks fell short of a sustained, well-financed growth strategy. Previously, the interest just wasn't there, says Tom Gilbert, a Munising real estate appraiser.

"But once they decided to expand the casino, it became a no-brainer."

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From the outside, Christmas Kewadin Casino resembles an oversized log cabin with a turquoise roof.

Inside are the flashing neon lights and cacophony of jingles, beeps and rattles typical of gambling halls. But with the high log ceiling, crossbeams, Santa-and-sleigh chandelier and carpeting that looks like gift wrap, there's a feel of a rustic country lodge decked out for the holidays.

"We felt it was important to enhance the Christmas theme instead of clashing with it," manager Karen Heyrman says.

She shrugs off complaints that Christmas and gambling don't mix: "We do a lot for the community. I don't think anybody else envisioned the potential this area had. We took a chance, and once other people saw it, they followed suit."

A meat market, an auto garage and a snowmobile and motorbike race track recently have opened. The Beauchaines are enlarging their store to add a gift shop - and a place for Santa to greet kids as customers eat hot dogs and ice cream.

Just down the road, Gilbert and others are building a gas station and a motel called the "Pair-A-Dice Inn." They believe the casino will create a demand for overnight accommodations that other tourist attractions have not.

"People come to this area for snowmobiling or Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, but we haven't had any activities to offer them at night," Gilbert says. "There's no movie theater in all of Alger County."

Rick Carr hopes someone will revive Thorson's idea of making toys or ornaments. Or perhaps candy - anything to prevent the yuletide character from being lost.

Don't worry, Gilbert says. There's no reason for folks in Christmas to sing, "It's beginning to look a lot like Vegas."

"I'm hoping that in 10 years, so much will be going on that people will say, 'Oh, by the way, there's a casino here,"' he says. "It'll be an afterthought. That's when we'll know that Christmas has arrived."