ONLINE EXCLUSIVE: A HAGGERTY CHRISTMAS

The dazzling display of Christmas lights at the Dan and Heather Haggerty farmstead on the northwest corner of Freeman grows out one of those, “once you start you can’t stop” scenarios.

They don’t explain it in those words, exactly, but Dan and Heather both say the world of white lights that illuminate their property took on a life of its own after the young Haggerty family moved to Freeman and settled on the P.P. Kleinsasser place in 2000.

“All those buildings; it just seemed like they were asking to be lit up,” says Heather, whose family moved to her home community from Ohio when their oldest son, Ryan, was 2 years old and their second son, Brennan, was 6 months old.

“It seemed like a really good idea those first few years and now it’s like, really? Do we want to do this again?’” she says.

“I just asked her this year, ‘At what age are you still going to let me climb the windmill tower?’” says Dan, who is responsible for hanging many of the lights and is tasked with all the high work.

The Haggerty display began taking off after 2001, the first Christmas the Haggerty family was in the home that was built in 1905 and once included 19 outbuildings. Incidentally, they are just the second family to occupy the edge-of-town homestead. 

“It didn’t start this big,” says Heather, “It probably started with a tree in the window. Dan was the one who came up the idea of putting lights on the barn, and then it was, ‘We’re going to do this building and that building, and what do you think about doing that building?’”

The net result is on display today — six illuminated buildings, a large star atop a windmill tower and a fence lit up with thousands of feet of white lights. There’s also a large nativity illuminated by a spotlight. It’s a Christmas wonderland that attracts drive-by onlookers and favorable comments that keep the Haggerty family at it year after year.

“I think that’s part of why we keep doing this,” said Dan.

Decorating grew into a family project as the number of Haggerty children grew — from  Ryan and Brennan to Ryan, Brennan and Gavin, and now to Praba, an adopted daughter who is a sixth grader at Freeman Public.

“All our kids were taught at an early age, ‘If Daddy falls, you call 911,’” says Dan, who built the star that accents the display. But, he says the wreath on the barn, hung with an assist from a 40-foot extension ladder, is actually the most nerve-wracking to hang, “just because of the length of the ladders; that’s where I always feel the most nervous.”

“The tower is taller, but it’s easy to hold on to something there,” he continues. “If I’m going to fall, I just toss the star and grab on to something. But if I’m hanging the wreath, I’ve got both hands off the ladder. And putting the ladder against the peak of the barn, which I have to do, means I’m away a good 8 feet away from the barn.”

“He does all the high work — the climbing of the ladders — and I just come up with, ‘Well, let’s try this,’” says Heather.

“I’m more careful than I used to be because now I know if I fall it’s going to be really bad,” Dan says. “Heather says if I fall I should make sure I do it right — right on the head and be done with it.”

The setup takes time.

Decorating begins over the Thanksgiving holiday, when the boys are around, and continues over the course of several days. Everything needed is boxed up, labeled and stored for 11 months of the year and then distributed for decorating when another season rolls around.

Everybody has their job to do, says Heather, and the Haggertys have learned a lot over the years. Obviously, check your lights before stringing them, says Heather. Make sure you start with the non-plugin end of the string when starting on a building, says Dan.

And years ago, Dan discovered something he calls “the magic gun” which shoots a surge of electricity into the port of a light on a section of string that has gone out, instantly fixing the problem.

“Without that,” he says, “I don’t think we would still be doing this.”

Six different outlets are used to light the entire display:

Electricity in the pump house is used to light the building itself and the star;

There’s an outlet in the barn for the building and the wreath;

The fence is lit using electricity from the yard light pole;

An outlet in the garage lights that building, the nativity and a small tree that features the only colored lights on the yard;

The summer kitchen is lit using its own outlets;

And the house itself features as many as a dozen strings of icicle lights that hang around the closed-in front entrance the Haggertys added to the home after moving in, and further up on the two-story house, near the distinctive attic dormer window that is a distinctive feature on these early-20th century homes.

Dan estimates getting the 11 extension cords and five timers all set up alone takes several hours, with the entire project taking as many as 10 hours over the course of multiple days.

“And then it’s maintaining them for the rest of the month,” says Heather. “When a section goes out, you have to figure out, can you fix it? Do we have to double back with more lights?”

And both are the first to admit it’s not perfect, “but from the road you really can’t tell.”

Neither Dan nor Heather take a crack at even guessing how many lights are used — there are 35 strands; Dan counted them — but said they try to get industrial strength 100-feet lengths when they can because they hold up better against the elements. Those have been harder and harder to find, they say, and lights in general were tough to come by this year.

“I had a few more things I would have done this year,” Heather says, “but we don’t have the lights for them.”

While the Haggerty family might grumble a bit when it comes time to decorate, their wheels are turning nonetheless.

Heather has hopes of including the grain bin and machine shed at some point — “I feel like they’re left out” — and Dan has wondered about eliminating the white lights on the buildings and lighting up the row of evergreens on the west side of the property with dazzling lights — “every single one of them. But talk about a lot of work.”

He also thinks it would be fun to install an electric fence around their small herd of goats and then hang glow sticks around the necks of the animals — something that would be sure to turn some heads.

For now, the Haggertys are pleased with the display that lights up the northwestern quadrant of Freeman and all it represents — a family project, Christmas spirit and a reminder of what the season is all about thanks to that homemade star that rises above everything else.

Just as it should.