Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

NATCHEZ — Sim Mosby grew up in Natchez with his late father Bill and mother Ellen Mosby. He was the youngest sibling, with a brother named Rush, and a sister named Dee.

Was he spoiled?

“Somewhat,” Mosby admitted.

Childhood Christmases were an exciting time, he said. “Christmases were always enjoyable and memorable.”

The family would always go to visit grandparents and the children couldn’t wait on Christmas morning to see what Santa Claus had brought them. They put out milk and cookies the night before, just as many families do with their children.

Mosby carried on these traditions with his two boys Cole and Sam, who are now 25 and 21 years old respectively.

Every Christmas they were made to wait upstairs and couldn’t come down until he and his wife Besty were awake. The boys would stomp on the floor loudly to make sure their parents awoke.

“When the kids were little we started pretty early,” he said. “Around 6:30.”

Mosby said he still remembers sitting on Santa Claus’s lap as a child. “It was magical,” he said. But he has never had the opportunity before to be Santa himself.

That changes on Saturday, Dec. 23, when Mosby will wear the suit to ride in the Santa Parade and deliver the Natchez Children’s Christmas Tree toys to hundreds of boys and girls in the community.

“I’m truly humbled and honored to be selected for Santa 2023 and my wife is to be Mrs. Claus,” he said. “When you look back at all the Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus in the past and what great men and women they were, it’s an honor to fall in their footsteps.”

What Mosby looks forward to most about becoming Santa, he said, is seeing all the children Saturday at the Braden School.

“Seeing all the smiling children enjoying the Christmas experience is truly heartwarming,” he said.

Outside the suit, Mosby is a CPA and partner at Silas Simmons LLP.

For approximately 30 years he has been a member of the Santa Claus Committee, a local men’s club that chooses a new Santa each year and supports the Children’s Christmas Tree fund. As a member, he has been in attendance at the Santa parade and at the Children’s Christmas Tree presentation of gifts.

Mosby remembers a time when the gifts were given out at the Natchez Children’s Home when children lived there.

“That was a very special time,” he said. “It’s heart-wrenching to see these wonderful children not at home on Christmas. One year, one young girl sang a song. She was a beautiful young girl with a beautiful voice and it just kind of put the meaning of family and the Christmas spirit in everybody. There wasn’t a dry eye in the room.”

Mosby will start Saturday morning early and be picked up at his home to ride in a convertible Rudolph position in the Santa Parade, which starts at around 8:15 a.m. and continues all day long through many Natchez neighborhoods. At around 11:15 a.m., the parade stops at the Braden School for the Children’s Christmas Tree presentation in the auditorium. This year children will receive gifts as usual, but their families will also be blessed with a Christmas ham or turkey thanks to the Santa Claus Committee and the generosity of community donors.

The families are pre-selected, but anyone can catch a glimpse of Santa Claus and catch candy in the parade.

“We’ll go try to spread Christmas cheer the rest of the day,” Mosby said. “It’s a great Natchez tradition.”