Christmas is canceled at 1264 Whiteheart Avenue.
After years of twinkling holiday lights at his Marco Island house, Ron Spering says he’s given up his popular, eye-popping display and leaving Southwest Florida.
It’s breaking his heart, he admits.
Christmas has always been his thing.
“That’s what I do,” says Spering, 74. “That’s been my life-long hobby. … It’s hard to accept.”
Every year, Spering’s jaw-dropping display attracted thousands of people and raised money for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. The elaborate display was even featured on the TV news and in newspapers.
“It’s been a passion from the start,” Spering said in 2023. “I’ve always loved Christmas.”
Marco Island house brought Christmas cheer and helped St. Jude
Spering’s 2024 display packed his house and yard with tons of holiday fun, including about 100,000 lights, a 15-foot-tall white Christmas tree and many things Spering — who also restores horse-drawn sleighs as a hobby — built himself from wood.
Those hand-made items included a life-sized Nativity scene, a Disney castle with Mickey and Minnie, a sleigh where people could take photos, and an approximately 12-foot-high gingerbread house with lots of gingerbread people.
There was also a wooden box for donations to St. Jude. Spering started that fundraising drive five years ago, he says, and it raised about $92,000.
“That’s pretty neat,” Spering said in 2024. “People have been very supportive and very generous.”
Spering says he’s loved bringing Christmas to Whiteheart Avenue every year and helping the sick kids at St. Jude. But his injuries from a March 2023 car accident have caught up with him.
He just doesn’t have the ability to put up all those lights and Christmas trees anymore.
Surviving I-75 crash to bring more Christmas to Marco Island
Spering guesses he was driving 70 mph on Interstate 75 — he doesn’t remember anything from the accident — when his heart valve stopped pumping, he passed out and he ran off the road into a tree.
Doctors didn’t think he’d survive his injuries, he says.
“(I had) 10 screws in the back, seven broken ribs, a broken coccyx, a broken sternum, a severe concussion, sepsis,” he says. “For two weeks, they couldn’t tell my wife if I would live. And then they said if he does live, we’re not sure if he’ll be able to walk.”
Miraculously, he did live. And he was able to walk again, too.
And that Christmas and the Christmas after — with the help of his neighbors — Spering managed to continue putting up that dazzling light display that everyone loves. Including him.
Spering says he loved watching people walk through the display, point, laugh and take photos and video. “I’d look out the window and watch people… The kids get a kick out of it.”
But reality and his injuries finally caught up with him, he says. His left foot still goes numb. And he can’t bend down to touch the floor anymore — something he needs to be able to do to work on his light displays.
“There’s a hundred extension cords on the ground, you know,” he says. “So it kills me.”
Holiday tradition lives on at other Marco Island homes
Now he and his wife are selling their house and moving to The Villages, the popular retirement community in Central Florida. Their last day at Whiteheart Avenue was Monday. Dec. 8.
Spering does have some good news, though: One last Christmas present to the people of Marco Island.
You can still see some of his display’s most cherished decorations. He’s sold or donated many of them to other places all over Marco Island and beyond.
That Nativity scene now sits outside of Lely Presbyterian Church, for example. And two neighbors at 1952 and 1955 Sheffield Ave. bought many of Spering’s most popular items for their own elaborate holiday displays.
Both families were huge fans of Spering’s annual display.
“He inspired us,” says Tim Hager.
The Siems family now has Spering’s wood-and-metal Grinch, rooftop snowflakes, a wooden sleigh, various snowman figures and — one particularly beloved prize for Susan Siems — the “Mr. and Mrs. Snowman” bench where people often sat and posed for selfies.
“I was in love with that,” Susan Siems says. “I love snowmen.”
As for the Hagers, they got Spering’s 10-foot-tall Disney castle, his 12-foot-tall wooden gingerbread house and more.
“They were just iconic pieces,” Hager says. “My family always loved going by his display.”
They also got Spering’s wooden collection box for St. Jude. Hager says he’ll continue that spirit of giving.
“Ron does way too much good in the world for the tradition to die,” he says.
What’s next for Spering in The Villages
In all, about 10 different places in the Marco Island area have collected Spering’s former decorations. “That’s what I’m really, really happy about,” he says.
Spering hates to leave his display behind, he says, but he won’t give up the Christmas spirit at his new home. That tradition will continue, too.
His new house in The Villages is much smaller, he says. But he still plans to put up a holiday display — just in a much scaled-down version.
He loves Christmas too much to stop.
“I’ll put as much as I can possibly put out there,” he says. “It won’t be anything like it’s been for years (on Marco Island). … But maybe it’s best that I slow down.”
Charles Runnells covers arts and entertainment for The News-Press and the Naples Daily News. To reach him, call 239-335-0368 or email crunnells@usatodayco.com. Follow or message him on social media: Facebook(@charles.runnells.7), Instagram (@crunnells1) and X (@CharlesRunnells)
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This article originally appeared on Marco Eagle: Christmas lights go dark at Marco Island home, but tradition lives on
Reporting by Charles Runnells, Naples Daily News / Marco Eagle
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
