SPRINGFIELD — If the evening sky is clear tonight and Saturday, December’s full Cold Moon will add to the limelight at Springfield’s largest annual community event.

Performances of the town’s 34th live nativity pageant are today and Saturday under the stars on the ground’s of the town’s community center.

“It’s been a good project for our community and a great statement about Springfield,” said Doris Weber, a founding member of Springfield Area Theatre Association.

The association — also known as SANTA — is the official sponsor of the event, with volunteers from all of Springfield’s churches participating.

Considered as a gift from Springfield’s churches and residents, there is no admission for the pageant that retells the biblical story of the birth of Christ in Bethlehem.

“At this time of year, I get all wound up about the pageant — it looks so nice with all the lights on it,” Ed Meidl said.

A 30-year veteran performer with the all-volunteer group, Meidl begins to get in character weeks before the pageant opens.

“Each September, I start to grow my beard.”

Tonight he’ll return in his role as Lead Wise Man. He’ll be walking ahead of two other volunteers who also will portray a Magi. He used to ride in on a camel until the year his mount slipped on an icy patch.

Neither the animal or Meidl was injured; however, the 85-year-old Meidl now prefers to be a pedestrian Wise Man in fur-lined snow boots.

Several hundred volunteers work behind the scenes of the winter outdoors production. They put on pageant fundraisers such as a summer burger feeds, holiday luncheons and bake sales.

Katie (Helget) Mueller is a longtime volunteer and was also part of the community chorus.

She was about 6 when she attended her first pageant. She recalls being in awe of the animals and that she had been treated to the experience of climbing aboard a camel for an afternoon ride.

In its early years, the production took place downtown.

“I remember bundling up and bringing blankets or sleeping bags with us to watch the pageant. Then when I was about 10 years old, I finally got the chance to be in the pageant as one of the angels.”

Wearing her robed costume and angel wings, Mueller sometimes had to steel herself against the frigid weather and snow falling, making the performances sometimes challenging.

Mueller, who returned in the role of an angel several times throughout her childhood, practiced with the other performers at the basement of the Farmers and Merchants Bank.

By the time she was a high school senior, her billing status had moved up — she was awarded the role of Archangel Gabriel.

“After graduating from college and returning to my hometown, I joined the Springfield nativity choir and I have been singing in that ever since.”

Her husband and children also now participate.

The community attraction apparently has numerous devotees from outside Springfield as well.

In 2017, the event was chosen as Minnesota’s No. 1 nativity pageant by participants in a WCCO-TV’s 2017 online poll. The pageant was featured on the “Best Of” segment of a newscast.

Thanks to the boost in publicity, attendance at the 2018 event ramped up to about 500. Since its beginning in 1985, the pageant’s audience has enjoyed continuous growth and usually averages at about 200 per show.

The origin of the community’s pageant can be traced to about four years after Springfield’s 100-year anniversary in 1981.

Residents enjoyed the successful reunion. Several gathered to brainstorm future events that would revive interest in their town, said Doris Weber, a pageant founder.

They discussed holding an event sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas. A pastor suggested a live nativity scene.

The group thought the event needed to go all out. “That’s when we decided to bring in the camels,” Weber said.

Meidl hopes the crowds aren’t deterred by the weekend forecast of cold weather.

Regardless of the outdoor temperatures, he plans to deliver a gift of either gold, frankincense or myrrh to this year’s baby Jesus actor, Allison and Josh Nachreiner’s daughter, Eva.

“I’ve never worn gloves (during his pageant role) and I don’t plan to ruin my record.”

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