NATCHEZ — For generations of Natchez residents the spirit of Christmas is Lanus Hammack.

The chief designer of Christmas scenes and displays that turned the International Paper plant into a temporary holiday wonderland became known as Mr. Christmas.

“It was almost like a magic word. He was a celebrity,” local artist Burnley Cook said. “He was a very, very unique man.”

Cook spearheaded recent efforts to rebuild and restore many of Hammack’s displays now open at the Natchez Visitor Reception Center.

From 5:30 to 8 p.m. today, the visitor center will have hayrides and children’s activities and a visit by Santa Claus at a Family Christmas Festival celebrating the center’s Christmas light displays.

Before Hammack died in 2013 at the age of 90, Cook had the opportunity to meet Hammack and share stories about the displays.

“He thought of them as his children,” Cook said. “He put his mind, his heart and his devotion to God in those displays.”

Thousands of people would visit the annual Christmas display  which first went up when the mill opened in the 1950s and continued to delight visitors up until 1973 when IP decided to discontinue the annual display because of the nation’s energy crisis.

Several years later, the displays were resurrected by a group of IP employees who knew how special the displays were for the community. Retired from the plant, Hammack helped rebuild many of the exhibits, which were displayed at the mill and other locations up until the Christmas before the mill closed in 2003.

“The displays were a great source of pride for the employees who gave of their time and effort,” former IP communications manager Lillie DeShields said. “It was a special thing for them.”

Nancy Eidt was one of the employees who worked directly with Hammack. Eidt had a notebook that Hammack compiled that provided specific details, including how to light the displays and how far apart the exhibits were to be.

Through the years, Eidt’s admiration for Hammack grew.

“He was big man in my eye because he was so honorable,” Eidt said. “It was his spirit, countenance and ability to talk from his heart. He was a wonderful, wonderful man.”

Hammack’s daughter Jan Swoveland said the Christmas display will always be a part of her dad’s memory.

“It was part of his identity,” Swoveland said. “He was a deeply religious man. He safeguarded those displays.”

When her father died, Swoveland said she kept the box of Christmas cards Hammack used as inspiration for many of his displays. From the cards, Hammack drew everything from waving snowmen to the wise men in the nativity.

“They are a like a backstage pass to his thinking,” Swoveland said.

In the row of decorations currently on display at the Natchez Visitor Reception Center, only one is an original painting from Hammack.

Inspired by a Currier and Ives Christmas Card, the painting is of a winter landscape, complete with a water mill, horse-drawn sleigh and oxen.

Created in 1972, the last year the decorations were on display before the energy crisis, the painting was the only artwork Hammack saved from the original designs.

“We are appreciative of the love the community has for the displays and how they have chosen to let them live on,” Swoveland said.

Swoveland said she and her family are especially thankful for Cook’s work on the displays, so much so they have honored him with a title similar to her father’s.

“We have renamed him Mr. Christmas Too because Burnley has done so much for the community and not asked a lot for it,” Swoveland. “That has meant a great deal to us. It has touched us.”