Click on the photo at left to scroll through a gallery of photos from A Christmas Story House.
CLEVELAND — “You’ll shoot your eye out.”
It’s an iconic movie line. Nearly everyone – his mother, his teacher, a department store Santa – tells that to Ralphie when he asks for a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas. And not just a BB gun, Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot Range Model air rifle with a compass in the stock and "this thing which tells time" (it’s a sundial).
The movie, of course, is “A Christmas Story,” a holiday classic often show in a 24-hour rotation on Christmas Day on TBS. The house used as Ralphie’s family home in the movie is in Cleveland, so naturally, I had to take a brief respite from politics and pay a visit.
A Christmas Story House & Museum is a three-building complex south of the downtown Cleveland. It encompasses the house itself, a museum with memorabilia from the movie and, of course, a gift shop where, for $159, you can buy the leg lamp that played a key part of the movie’s plot. Don’t want to spend that much? That’s OK. You can buy leg lamps of all sizes – including a small night light.
Everyone knows the movie, so I won’t rehash the plot. But here are a few things I learned on my tour:
- The current owner of the house, Brian Jones, is a huge fan of the movie. After some friends built him a leg lamp as a gift, he put it in his front window. So many people asked him where he got the lamp that he decided to make and sell them. The first year he sold 500 of the lamps, which he made in his living room and sold on Amazon.
- The leg-lamp business became so lucrative that he launched a website – RedRyderLegLamps.com.
- He bought the house in 2004 so that, according to Alex, our tour guide, people “could relive the Parker family Christmas every day of the year.”
- One of the most famous scenes in the movie is when Ralphie’s friend, Flick, gets his tongue stuck on a frozen flag pole. The scenes was actually a bit a movie magic. The flag pole was actually a piece of PVC pipe painted to look like a metal pole. A small hole was cut in the pipe for the actor to stick the tip of his tongue in. A dental vacuum held the tongue in place while the scene was filmed. (Sorry for the spoiler!)
- The interior of the house today doesn’t match the film. The man who owned the house when the movie was made was offered $20,000 to use his house for two weeks. The payment equaled the actual value of the home in those days. He used the money to totally renovate the interior of the house.
- Another reason the interior scenes don’t match the actual house is that many of the scenes were actually filmed on a Canadian sound stage. Next time you watch the movie, pay attention to interior scenes. Those scenes that show natural light streaming in where filmed in Cleveland, the others on the soundstage.
- The leg lamp arrived at the Parker home in a large wooden crate marked with “THIS END UP.” Unfortunately, the prop man who built the crate didn’t properly measure the house’s door. So he had to trim it. In the scenes filmed in Cleveland, the box is marked “HIS END UP.” Look for that next time.
- It took Brian Jones two years to renovate the house and he opened the attraction Thanksgiving weekend 2006. Five thousand people visited on opening day alone.
The house, of course, is in a residential area of Cleveland called Tremont. The house’s executive director, Angela Dickerson, told me the neighborhood was made up of steel mill workers. She says one of the current neighbors was born on the street, moved away only to serve in the Army, then moved back and bought the house next to his parents.
As you might imagine, an attraction that draws some 65,000 visitors a year could be a distraction to the neighbors. But Dickerson said everyone has been supportive. So supportive that the attraction is working to pay them back. A Christmas Story House foundation was created in 2013 to raise money for the neighborhood.
Homeowners are allowed to apply to the foundation for grants to improve their homes – add new siding, replace the window, expand. Fundraisers, including a very popular 5K held each December, are held to benefit the foundation.
I didn’t know about the foundation until I visited the house. Ralphie may have thought the BB gun was the best gift he would ever receive. I liked to think “A Christmas Story” has been a pretty good gift for the neighborhood.
