NATCHEZ — This Christmas, Broadway Street is host to a scene from the past. And if a group of local Christmas activists has its way, it will be a host to that same scene every year.

After International Paper closed, the company’s popular mechanical Christmas decorations were briefly displayed at the Natchez Visitor Reception center before being put into storage.

In 2004, they were restored and placed on D.A. Biglane Drive, and for Christmas 2006 the animated displays were placed on the Natchez bluffs.

In recent years, however, the decorations have been placed in storage — at least until now.

Local resident Mike Lomasney has been working to once again restore the displays and get them out for the public to see.

“I am trying to patch some up as quickly as I can to get them out for this year,” Lomasney said. “Some of them that are in storage are absolutely beautiful.”

So far, Lomasney has restored a display of Santa in his sleigh being pulled by the reindeer. The sleigh bucks and the reindeer move back and forth — at least after dark, when Lomasney set a timer to turn it on.

Restoring that display meant replacing the motor and replacing the mechanical elements, as well as touching up the paint. Meanwhile, Lomasney said he has started work on a snowman couple that wave signs, a 6-foot-tall Santa who waves and — if time permits — an elf that plays the banjo.

“They are cute as they can be,” he said. “It’s a shame that this stuff got shoved in a corner in a storeroom.”

The restoration work got started because of the Christmas in Natchez committee.

“As we formed our committee, I was looking at things like, let’s get new wreaths, let’s get a new drum, let’s decorate the bluff,” Christmas in Natchez co-chair Ginger Hyland said. “Every once in a while, I would hear people say something about the old IP ornaments, but I assumed — and this is what I get for assuming — they were probably just little lighted outlying ornaments that had burned up and been worn out and discarded years ago.”

After a lunch with Christmas in Natchez co-chair Regina Charboneau and Laura Godfrey, where the discussion of the ornaments came up again, however, Godfrey said she knew where the decorations were stored and set it up so Hyland could see them, Hyland said.

The decorations were at Natchez public works, and Hyland said when she walked in she was amazed at what she found.

“We go in and I see these unbelievable large box displays with hand-painted scenes on them that are just exquisite,” she said.

The group located other displays at the Margaret Martin Performing Arts Center, and after they were unsuccessful in locating the man who originally restored the boxes, they turned to Lomasney, whose wife is on the Christmas committee.

Lomasney is donating his labor, and Hyland said the repairs are being financed by the Natchez Chamber of Commerce’s Christmas fund.

The time Lomasney has to restore displays for this year is limited, and so only a few displays will be completed in time for Christmas, but Hyland said the work won’t end with this Christmas, and the committee hopes to have all of the displays restored for next year.

“We have a whole year now to work on the rest of them and to add to it,” Hyland said.

In particular, Lomasney said he wants to build a 40-foot-long Christmas train hauling Christmas presents that will bob up and down with the motion of the train.

“All this takes is somebody who is willing to put it together and somebody willing to defray the costs of the materials,” he said. “It’s all for the help of the city.”

Lomasney’s idea is how the committee plans to finance the restoration of the other displays, Hyland said.

“We will look for sponsors for next year,” she said. “A classroom, a business or even a private person can do it.”

“The prospect of having many of them on display next year is terribly exciting.”

Hyland said those who want to get involved in the restoration effort for next year could contact Chamber of Commerce Director Debbie Hudson at 601-445-4611.