Santas, elves, marching musicians descend on L5P for Atl SantaCon

The merry brigade numbered roughly 100 people this year, including the band. They started at The Vortex Bar & Grill before parading on to Star Bar (at Little Vinyl Lounge), Hudson Grille, Little 5 Pub, Elmyr, Variety Playhouse and Euclid Avenue Yacht Club.

At each stop, the band played festive holiday favorites including “Feliz Navidad,” “Santa Baby,” and “Jingle Bell Rock,” along with other bar-crowd favorites like “Tequila.”

Credit: Ben Gray for the AJC

Credit: Ben Gray for the AJC

Credit: Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal

Credit: Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal

Inspired by San Francisco’s Cacophony Society (an art collective famous for staging bizarre, unauthorized public events and stunts), Atl SantaCon’s founder, artist Shannon “Chw” Joiner, started Atl SantaCon in 2005 with a group of friends he had met through a regional Burning Man group called the Dirty Southern Burners.

“The event started as a flash mob holiday bar crawl,” Joiner said.

The first year, the group of only 15 people convened in Santa gear and recruited bargoers, panhandlers and anyone else willing to join. They spontaneously invited a trombone player they spotted on the street playing for change, handed out dollar-store Santa hats and merrily sang dirty Christmas carols all through the night. That trombone player, Joiner remembers, accompanied SantaCon every year for the next four.

Lee Ford Faherty, one of Joiner’s fellow burners, was there the very first year. Her husband, John Faherty, joined the second. They’ve attended almost every year since, in addition to traveling to SantaCons in New York, Boston and Savannah.

This year, the Fahertys, alongside their service-dog-in-training, golden Lab George Emerson Peabody, donned a family costume Lee made from scratch.

The ornate, iced-blue costumes were modeled after Siberia’s Ded Moroz and Snegurochka — Grandfather Frost and his granddaughter snow maiden.

Nearby, 63-year-old Rhonda Dinwiddie Hagler from Lithonia, a SantaCon first-timer, joined the crowd with three cousins and siblings wearing a blow-up costume of Santa riding Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

“This is just awesome,” Hagler said. “We’re all laughing. We’re smiling. We’re getting along, giving compliments, taking pictures. It’s all about the love. It’s Christmas season and I feel it.”

Credit: Danielle Charbonneau

Credit: Danielle Charbonneau

Credit: Danielle Charbonneau

Credit: Danielle Charbonneau

In SantaCon’s first five years, the event nearly doubled in size until it reached a crowd of about 250, Joiner said. In the event’s largest years, it featured a dance instructor who taught participants a Santa group dance out front of the Vortex Bar & Grill.

“It’s calmed down since those days, but the smaller intimate crowd is actually more true to what we started it for,” Joiner said.

The event has shifted its emphasis over time to become more community-centric and differentiate itself from other urban SantaCons like New York’s, which is known for its rowdiness and drunken debauchery. Particularly after Joiner quit drinking in 2010, he wanted the event to serve a deeper purpose.

“We started working with the bars and telling them when we were coming and they would donate to a charity on our behalf,” Joiner said.

Since then, SantaCon has raised more than $12,000 for local charities, including Lifeline animal shelter, Lost-n-Found Youth, Drawchange, Atlanta Harm Reduction Coalition and other nonprofits.

Last year, when SantaCon fell on the same day as Make Music Day, organizers wanted to upgrade the event’s musical experience by collaborating with Seed & Feed. The marching band’s addition has attracted a more family-friendly crowd and added to the joyousness.

Credit: Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal

Credit: Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal

Credit: Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal

Credit: Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal

SantaCon took a hiatus during the COVID years, which almost ended the tradition. But in its post-COVID years, Joiner said, the event has worked more closely with the Little Five Point Business Association.

“Working with (them) has been instrumental in us all working together and keeping this going,” he said.

Kelly Stocks, vice president of the association and president of the Little 5 Points Historic Cultural District, has taken on a leadership role in organizing the event, which she said echoes the spirit of the neighborhood.

“I think Little Five has always been accepting of everyone … this crazy crew of misfits that all fit together,” she said. “It’s always been that way. … It’s been my goal with the cultural district to try to preserve a lot of our craziness that we’ve always had.”

Each December, that craziness includes a romping, roving crew of Santas, elves and reindeer.