Mayor’s Christmas Tree lighting ceremony emphasizes generosity of KC

Beverly Cherrito had been to the Mayor’s Christmas Tree lighting ceremony many times. She used to come to the Crown Center tradition with her husband, now deceased, when their children were small.
Friday evening, she smiled in the glow of the small white candle in her hand — her grown son and his two children by her side — and whispered over “Silent Night,” the event’s crowning song by the Kansas City Symphony Chorus.

The event “puts people in the mood,” Cherrito said. “Maybe they’ll be generous.”
And with a flip of a switch, Crown Center’s square changed from flickering in the soft glow of the crowd’s candles to blazing in the radiance of the lights covering the mayor’s tree, a 100-foot Douglas fir, and the thousands of white bulbs in the trees around it.
One thing not lost on the crowd was the benevolence of the city the tree stands in. Mayor Mark Funkhouser predicted that this year’s donations to the Mayor’s Christmas Tree Fund would top last year’s total.
Lathrop & Gage donated at least $4,000. A two-year lease of a Smart car was donated, and the Power & Light District pledged to donate all of Friday night’s cover charges to the fund.
Tom Dart moved to Kansas City this year from Chicago, which has its own tree-lighting ceremony.
“It’s much more personal and intimate here,” Dart said.
The night’s special guest, actor Eric Stonestreet, also attested to the warmth of this city, his hometown. He told how Kansas City played a part in his path from studying at Kansas State University to appearing on the ABC comedy series “Modern Family.” When the show’s pilot ran, he told his bosses that Kansas City was the No. 1 market watching “Modern Family” that night.
“It was a pleasure for me to say that,” Stonestreet told the crowd. “And it’s a pleasure for me to be here.”
One-year-old R.J. Dunn of Grandview was happy to be there, too, delighted by the crowd and only slightly irritated that he wasn’t allowed to run freely through it.
Older children, not as bundled as in years past, ran through the square’s fountain.
The ceremony ended with an announcement from the night’s master of ceremonies, Chris Stigall of KCMO 710 Talk Radio.
“It’s Christmas in Kansas City,” he said. “It’s official.”