Parade will portray real St. Nick

Millstadt Weihnacht Festival Parade

When: Noon Sunday

Where: First block of East Laurel Street to the VFW Hall, 200 Veterans Drive.

This Sunday, Mark Westhoff, a local historian and former president of the St. Clair County Historical Society, will don a costume of the magical [S]aint [Nicholas] and haunt the streets of Millstadt during their annual Weihnacht Festival Christmas Parade.

Legend says that a Catholic bishop, dressed in clerics and riding horseback, carried a sack full of gifts for children on a December night before the church celebrated the birth of Jesus Christ.

Stories, passed from generation to generation, say he even dropped gold through the windows of the poor.

His name was St. Nicholas of Myra, but children may know him better as the legendary and mysterious "St. Nick."

Nicholas, who lived in fourth-century Turkey, rapidly became a worldwide legend after his death, with different regions fastening their own culture to his image. Western Europe celebrated his feast day, Dec. 6, by giving gifts of candy and praying for miracles.

"Nicholas wore traditional church dress of a purple skull cap, a pointed hat and a pectoral cross," Westhoff said. "Basically something you'd see a modern Catholic bishop wear. He had a big crosier, and the stern look of a tough priest. That's what you'll see in the parade."

Story here.