Hearken back to holidays of old with homemade ornaments, jingle bells and carriage rides. The Museum of the Gulf Coast invites young and old to Sleigh Bells Ring! a free family fun day held in association with the traveling exhibition Going Places, exploring the age of horse-drawn transportation.

Held on Saturday, Dec. 5, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., this holiday event will feature a variety of family friendly activities including:

• A wide assortment of holiday crafts such as candy trains, jingle bell wristlets and gingerbread people

• Hands-on activities such as a scavenger hunt, Victorian dress-up, and “Make your own Snow”

• Exhibition of 41 unique objects including a full-sized pony surrey

• Animated film screenings

• Photo ops with “JR” the horse

• Horse-drawn carriage rides to the Pompeiian Villa historic home where visitors can view the home's extensive Santa Claus collection, enjoy hot chocolate, and take family photos in front of the Christmas tree (*read more about the Villa below).

Visitors will also have a chance to win four tickets to Moody Gardens including their Festival of Lights holiday celebration.

The Museum of the Gulf Coast's hosting of Going Places was made possible in part by grants provided by the Southeast Texas Arts Council and Entergy Texas, Inc. The exhibition will remain on view through the holidays until January 10, 2010.

The Museum of the Gulf Coast is owned and operated by the Port Arthur Historical Society in partnership with Lamar State College — Port Arthur and the City of Port Arthur. It is located at 700 Procter Street in downtown Port Arthur and is open daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 1 to 5 p.m. on Sunday. For more information about the Museum please visit www.museumofthegulfcoast.org or call (409) 982-7000.

Going Places was curated by William F. Ayres, director of collections and interpretation at the Long Island Museum of American Art, History, and Carriages. The exhibition has been made possible by NEH on the Road, a special initiative of the National Endowment for the Humanities. It is toured by Mid-America Arts Alliance. Founded in 1972, Mid America is a nonprofit regional arts organization based in Kansas City, Missouri. For more information, visit www.maaa.org and www.nehontheroad.org.



More About the Pompeiian Villa

Located at 1953 Lakeshore Drive in Port Arthur, the Pompeiian Villa is beautifully decorated for Christmas with an elaborate tree and all of the trimmings including a unique 500 piece Santa Claus collection. The Villa parlor is the perfect place to take a family portrait for the holidays so visitors are encouraged to bring their cameras.

Commissioned in 1900 by “Barbed Wire King” Isaac Ellwood, the Pompeiian Villa is a 10-room cottage built in a traditional Roman layout centered around a peristyle. Originally built as a winter home, the Villa features a three-sided courtyard, unique appointments and exquisite furnishings such as a Louis XVI parlor set and an art nouveau Baccarat crystal chandelier. Ellwood soon sold the home to the president of the Diamond Match Company, St. Louis tycoon James Hopkins. But when Hopkins' wife refused to live in the untamed frontier that was southeast Texas, he traded the Villa to Port Arthur entrepreneur George M. Craig for $10,000 worth of Texas Company stock. The stock represented 10 percent of the new company's total capitalization, but today it would trade in excess of hundreds of millions of dollars. The Craig family lived in the Villa for 43 years before selling it to Captain Arne Pederson who occupied the house for the next 19 years.

The home stood vacant for five years before it was rescued from demolition by the Port Arthur Historical Society in 1965. After years of renovation and repair, the home opened to the public in the early 1970s. It is now on the National Registry of Historical Places and hosts a Texas State Historical Medallion and Marker.