Head of Calgary Christmas light display retires

You likely know the Lions Festival of Lights, but maybe you aren't familiar with the work that goes into the iconic Calgary display.

After decades of lighting up Calgary skies, the chair of the famous Lions Festival of Lights is winding up his strings at the end of the season.

Otto Silzer, 84, has been involved with the festival since it was first launched “for good” in 1987.

“We wanted to have the display for the Olympics, to showcase the Lions’ activities in the city of Calgary,” he told CTV News. “And so we were able to find the sponsors and we were able to get support to initiate this big event.”

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The display — which is visited by tens of thousands of people every Christmas season — starts in November at Calgary’s Confederation Park Golf Course.

But the winter wonderland demands attention long before opening night.

“We start actually organizing this thing early in the year,” Silzer said.

“When we take it down, we basically plan next year and then we start in October checking all the light bulbs.”

The massive undertaking is all volunteer-led, which makes Silzer’s departure that much tougher.

Others say he’s responsible for organizing the group of helpers, and its Silzer’s vision that drives the roughly 2,000 hours of work.

He also leads the planning committee, designs the event’s course and handles donated funding.

“Otto brings a personality to deepen the motivation and brings a great spirit. And there are so many more things that other people aren’t aware of,” volunteer Mike Bell said.

“He cooks lunch and brings it out in the morning for the guys, organizes all the work parties.”

“He’s here literally every day for two months, so it’s going to be significantly different (next year).”

As for who is ready to take over, Silzer says “three or four” different people have stepped forward to pitch in. While no official successor has been chosen, the ideas are already flowing about how everyone can be utilized to ease the transition.

“We were just talking about maybe those people can, as a group, do the organizing and lessen the workload, so they don’t feel so responsible,” Bruce McKenzie said.

“It can be a lot for one leader.”

Silzer says he’s happy to do whatever he can to help.

“But I’m not getting any younger. And we started this display 39 years ago. Little did I know that I’d still be here doing this.”

“This is an institution in Calgary, and it’s all about the kids,” McKenzie added. “It’s about seeing the look on their face when they look up at the displays.”

“So we’ll just have to find a way to make it happen.”

To learn more about the iconic display, or to volunteer to help put up some of the 800,000-odd-lights, visit https://www.lionsfestivaloflights.ca/.