Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Prescott ready for Santa's annual visit

It's too late to worry about having been naughty or nice, as Santa will be making his annual trip at midnight tonight.

All year long Santa and his elves have been working hard making toys to be delivered tonight.

Santa has also been using modern technology, along with his favorite old methods, to make sure the boys and girls have been nice this year and have earned presents.

Locally, St. Nick will receive plenty of assistance to find houses and make sure the deliveries are made on time.

Prescott Police Chief Sam Reeder and the officers with the Prescott Police Department have placed themselves on red alert to help Santa.

They will escort Santa and the reindeer through Prescott.

"We're not going to let Santa down," Reeder said. "He has a lot of work to do, and we're going to make sure no one or nothing interferes with him in Prescott."

Nevada County Sheriff Steve Otwell and the Nevada County Sheriff's Office deputies will be working with the jolly old elf in the county.

Deputies will be placed in different parts of the county and assigned to work with Santa as needed.

Otwell and the deputies will help Santa find those hard to get to places in the county.

"Old Santa's got nothing to worry about when he comes to Nevada County tonight," Otwell said, "cause we're going to be there watching out for him and his reindeer."

The odds are, though, Santa won't need much help. After all, he invented stealth technology and operates his sleigh and reindeer on a zero-plus infinity time factor. This is how he manages to be everywhere in the world at exactly midnight on Christmas eve.

His sleigh moves so fast it can't be tracked by conventional radar, or be seen by the naked eye.

Santa took time out from his busy schedule of making toys and checking his list twice to talk with the Nevada County Picayune about his upcoming trip.

"With everything the children have been through in the past few years," he said, "I've decided to be extra nice to them this year.

"They've all been so good it's hard to believe."

Santa took a few minutes to remember how things were done in the old days, before he added new technology to the keeping track of the children, his sleigh and toy making.

"The weather was so bad when Rudolph was first old enough to fly," he said, "I wasn't sure we could even have Christmas. But Rudolph's shiny nose cut through the fog and snow like it wasn't there. The children were lucky that year."

Of course, this is basically the story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, the most famous reindeer of all.

St. Nick still relies on Rudolph's glowing beak to light his way around the world on Christmas eve. But, he's added some new things as well.

First, the jolly old elf is computer literate and has a system most governments envy. His computers have the capability of making infrared scans to keep track of who's being naughty and who's being nice. So, there's no hiding from Santa.

He keeps his fax number and email address a closely guarded secret so hackers can't break into his computer and alter the records, or track him down at the North Pole.

Of course, it would be impossible to find Santa at the top of the world, as his house and workshop are covered by force field which renders them invisible to everything.

The reindeer, he said, are especially looking forward to coming to Prescott as children will have magic reindeer food ready for them to snack on. The reindeer snacks were made at Breakfast with Santa Saturday, Dec. 21.

"I can't wait to get started," Santa said. "This is going to be a great Christmas for everyone.

"One last thing," he added. "I want all of the little boys and girls to get in bed early tonight and get a good night's sleep. Over the years children have tried staying up past midnight looking for me. What they don't understand is I can't be seen because I move so fast.

"Oh, yes, I want to thank them for the milk and cookies."