It all started out as a “harebrained idea,” said 2002 alumna Mary Elizabeth Luzar, now the Alumni Association’s assistant director of reunions and class activities.
At the start of her fourth year, the Sept. 11 attacks had devastated the country, including the University and Charlottesville communities. Luzar, who was a fourth-year trustee, said the trustees wanted to plan an event to bring their class together.
“What if we lit up the whole Lawn?” Luzar said one trustee suggested.
A few months later, the Lawn glowed from the light of 21,600 light bulbs — the first official Lighting of the Lawn.
But before that could happen, Luzar said the Fourth-Year Trustees had to convince the rest of the University to go along with the idea. Luzar said once Facilities Management signed on and University electrician Ralph Himelrick figured out the engineering, the event was set.
She never expected the magnitude of the event today, however. She estimated that between 4,000 and 6,000 people attended the first Lighting.
“I don’t think we thought it would stick around,” Luzar said.
Patricia Lampkin, vice president for student affairs who has lived on the Lawn both before and after the tradition began, said the first event “exceeded everyone’s expectations.” After she witnessed the Lighting, though, she was not surprised that it became a tradition.
“After I saw it, I thought it would take off,” Lampkin said.
Part of the reason why the Lighting of the Lawn has continued is because of funding from Lampkin’s office and also from grants from the Parents Committee. The event has not changed much since its inception seven years ago — a source of pride for Luzar.
“It’s stayed true to what we intended it to be, which is to bring the community together,” she said.
That feeling of unity is one of Fourth-Year Trustees President Christina Polenta’s favorite parts about the Lighting.
“It’s one of the events that brings the most numbers of community members to Grounds,” Polenta said. “That’s one of the things that I love about it. It’s an occasion where people from all walks of life can come and enjoy it.
As much as the Lighting of the Lawn is meant to attract members of the Charlottesville community to Grounds, it is also an event for the benefit of the University community. Students are able to de-stress before exams, and in Lampkin’s opinion, it’s an event to help students remember their larger place at the University.
“Given [the University’s] current size, we need to gather in certain ways a couple of times a semester so [students] feel like they are a part of something,” she said.
Planning for the event has grown substantially and now begins in April, when the president and vice president of the Fourth-Year Trustees choose the chair of the Lighting of the Lawn Committee, Polenta said. This year, the office of chair was awarded to fourth-year College student David Jessee.
Jessee said he relishes the opportunity to head up the University’s biggest holiday event. Christmas has always been his favorite holiday.
The holidays are something “I’ve always loved so much,” Jessee said. “Being able to take charge of something exactly like that at U.Va. — there’s nothing better.”
Jessee and the rest of his 20-member committee met for the first time during the third week of September and have been busy planning logistical elements of the event, from making sure all the lights work to ensuring there are enough trash cans and recycling bins on the Lawn during the event, he said.
“That’s one thing that keeps me up at night — [worrying that] I’m standing on the stage, counting down and one pavilion doesn’t light up,” Jessee said, adding, though, that he is confident that regardless of what happens, the Lighting will still be a hit.
For fourth-year students especially, this event will mark an important time in their college careers, he added.
“I think it’s going to be really special because of the time I put into it, but for me and the other fourth-year students, it’s the last big event on the Lawn before graduation,” Jessee said. “It allows us time to reflect on our first semester [of our fourth year] and on the first 3.5 years here ... It gives us time to think ahead to next semester and all the things we want to do. It allows us time to put things in perspective.”
To mark the occasion for the Class of 2009, the first 500 fourth-year students visiting the Lighting will receive a special gift, Polenta said. Pavilion V is also hosting a reception for the Class of 2009.
Though the Lighting began as an event geared toward fourth-year students because the Fourth-Year Trustees organized it, the Lighting today is marketed as a University- and community-wide event. Many pavilions are hosting receptions for different schools, and Lawn residents host receptions for various organizations.
One member of the University community preparing to welcome Lighting-goers into her home is Lampkin. In addition to decorating and preparing enough food for her guests, Lampkin said one of her main concerns is fitting so many people into her pavilion.
“You have to know there’s going to be an awful lot of people,” she said. “Things have to be clear because there [are] going to be a lot of bodies.”
Regardless of the effort and hard work it takes to keep up the tradition, Lampkin, Polenta and Jessee said when the lights come on, all the hard work is worth it.
“I feel like you get happy when the lights turn on,” Polenta said. “Everything is aglow. It turns a cold winter night into something magical.”
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