Come See the Spectacular Guernsey County Courthouse
Holiday Light Show!

Thursday, Nov. 10, 2011  through Saturday, Jan. 7, 2012
5:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. every night
Show continues until 11 p.m. Dec. 24-26 and Dec. 31-Jan. 1

Guernsey County Courthouse Lawn
Wheeling Ave, downtown Cambridge, Ohio

The courthouse comes alive nightly with thousands of pulsating lights synchronized to holiday music.

This magnificent 1881 building jumps into the 21st Century as it is bathed in colored lights, 36 animated light displays, and 15,000 lights outlining the building. The display is computer controlled with 364 electrical circuits meticulously synchronized to a holiday soundtrack, with a total of 30,000 lights.

Four different light shows, each 8 to 12 minutes in length, are performed throughout each evening beginning at 5:30 p.m., with the last show playing at 9 p.m.

The 2011 show features a children's set with holiday favorites like Frosty the Snowman including one song sung by Cambridge area 5th graders; contemporary recordings featuring local saxaphonist Gordon Hough; and a popular Christmas music selection.

SHOW SCHEDULE:
Top of the hour: children's Christmas favorites
15 minutes past the hour: traditional Christmas favorites
30 minutes past the hour: contemporary Christmas music featuring local saxaphonist Gordon Hough
45 minutes past the hour: modern Christmas music from the crowd-pleasing 2008 show debut

Hot chocolate will be available at the peddler's shop on the courthouse square during the light show, where visitors are also invited to consider offering a donation to help support this community project.

Visitors are advised to please park their cars at appropriate parking lots and spaces in downtown and watch the show from the Courthouse lawn so as not to cause a traffic hazard with stopped cars in the streets. For those wishing to hear the light show music from your parked car, tune in to 102.7 FM.

This spectacular show was designed by AVC Communications.

For a video preview of this spectacular display, please click here.

"This show ranks as one of the best light and music shows I have ever seen and I am including [major national attraction] in my comparisons. The individual/team who choreographed the program deserves to be commended. I also enjoyed how you incorporated local talent (the 5th grader singers and local saxophonist) in your program."
                                                                                               -- 2009 Visitor 

Please consider supporting the growth of this fabulous community program by making a tax-deductible donation in the amount of your choosing today! Simply click the button at the right to make a donation using your major credit card or PayPal account. All proceeds go toward maintaining and growing the Guernsey County Courthouse Holiday Light Show. THANK YOU for your support!

The Light Show's Story

The idea for the Guernsey County Courthouse Holiday Light Show was hatched by Grant Hafley, owner of AVC Communications in Cambridge. Grant wanted to create an experience that would give back to the community while also helping to attract visitors to the downtown area for the Dickens Victorian Village project.

Grant generously provided all the funding to develop and create this incredible light show, for which the community is extremely grateful.

Joel Losego, general manager at AVC Communications, tells the story about how the inaugural 2008 show was developed:

"It took over a year to design the light display. Everything had to be made from scratch. None of this came out of a box. Actually, it came out of a lot of boxes. Integrating all the parts was a challenge! Grant would sit down and start working on something and new ideas would keep coming out.

The light display uses 30,000 individual lights. There are 364 different circuits with a little electricity on each circuit. New LED lights were used to be energy efficient.

We took pictures of the courthouse and used them as a canvas to design the light displays. We programmed the music and lights in one-tenth-second intervals. It took six months to program the music and the light sequence before the lights went up.

A two-minute song took 18 hours of programming to coordinate the lights and music. Every circuit had to be programmed. Some circuits include red, blue and green lights so that we can combine them to get orange and purple and other colors.

The light show was tested on a laptop computer. Grant was the one who got all of the lights to be controlled from one location. The whole thing is now run from a memory card no bigger than the one that goes into a digital camera. We monitor the light show from the radio station with a remote camera.

Some of the windows in the courthouse are different sizes. They look the same from the sidewalk, but the window displays had to be custom built. We used re-bar frames and had to attach all of the lights to them.

The holiday scenes were custom designed and professionally created by Christmas Done Bright. There are about 1,200 feet of rope lights each with a mini bulb about every inch.

It was a challenge getting wires to all of the lights. The courthouse is a really old building with thick walls and places that couldn't be reached by ladders and lifts. You might have seen county employees [Craig Bates and Mike Wilson] hanging from ropes to reach some of the places. It took two guys working for two and a half months to install all of the frameworks for the lights."

Since this incredible work took place, an additional children's medley was created and added for the 2009 season, along with more scenes and lights in the trees around the courthouse square!

The Dickens Victorian Village project committee is deeply thankful for the generosity of AVC Communications and the work of Grant Hafley, Joel Losego and Dave Kessl and their "labor of love" for creating this community treasure!

You can play a part in helping this project grow. Show your support by making a tax-deductible donation through the nonprofit Cambridge Main Street by clicking on the "Donate" button above. Thank you!