Santa Heim

A Real Christmas Story

For a very brief time, Savage was the Christmas capital of the country thanks to Harry Harrison Heim.  Heim was born on March 14, 1883 in Baltimore, before moving with his family San Diego by World War I.  He worked at as a display manager and merchant for Marston Company’s Department Store even winning several awards for his merchandise displays.  In about 1936 in San Diego, he began to create Christmas ornaments, especially in the form of glass-blown balls.

Santa Novelties

By 1940 Harry was back in Baltimore and in 1941 established Santa Novelties, Inc.   Harry was expanding his business quickly and it was reported that in 1944 he made 12 million Christmas tree balls in his Baltimore factory on East Lombard Street and 11 million were made by hand.  The Baltimore Sun announcement on February 12th, 1948, that Harry Heim and Santa Novelties bought the Savage Manufacturing Company (SMC) lands, almost 500 acres”, was met with great joy and relief as the SMC mill had recently closed after operating for 125 years.  This new company is what the town had hoped for in bringing employment and opportunity. 

The deed between his company, Santa Novelties, Inc. and the SMC is dated August 24, 1948.  The sale price was reported to be $450,000 of which $200,000 were in mortgages to the SMC.  It was reported that he had a $2,500,000 business. He put everything he owned, and didn’t, into his Santa Heim venture.

One of the first things Harry did upon his arrival to Savage was to relocate his factory from Baltimore and to finally fix the local housing he bought, some without indoor toilets or electricity.  He also broke the “paternalistic” pattern of company owned housing, although SMC did provide very low rents, and he began to offer the Savage community the opportunity to purchase their homes or to continue renting fixed up housing without the deep discount provided by SMC. He was welcomed by the community even when he tried to turn Savage into “Santa Heim” in 1948 and 1949, but the novelty of a Santa village didn’t last.

Savage to Santa Heim

The Christmas of 1948 was a memorable and remarkable one.  It was like a circus came into town to stay and on opening day 5,000 children out of the total of 15,000 people attended with special trains for the attraction from Baltimore and Washington chartered by the B&O railroad. There were reindeer, horses and animated animals and even a replica “Tom Thumb” B&O train for the kids to ride on.  The town, including the post office, was painted in Christmas colors and the Savage Post Office was flooded with letters to Santa from children across the country. Harry lined the streets of Savage with 28,000 lights and 10 foot candy canes just like in the biggest cities.  He had big dreams for Santa Heim and that Christmas of 1948 made all things seem possible.

The fanfare for 1949 and 1950 was much less and by 1951 it was over.  Some folks didn’t want to change the name of Savage to Santa Heim, business fell off and workers loss wages, paint started to peel on houses he bought, and tax problems brought more problems. Although this tax-related charge was hyped-up in the newspapers, Mr. Heim ended up with only a $100 fine. All in all, Harry did his best to pay the bills but the money coming in just wasn’t enough, and perhaps he didn’t think through his plans well enough.  He sold what he could, in particular to the National Store Fixture Company in October 1950 before the IRS put the rest up for public auction in April 1951. Mr. Heim died of a heart attack less than two years later on January 30, 1953. The National Store Fixture Company owned Savage Mill until it sold their interests to the Winer family in 1965 who still owns the Mill today.  

Please see our book "Hidden History of Howard County" for the sources to all of this information.