By Bennett Hall
Corvallis Gazette-Times | Posted: Thursday, November 27, 2008 12:00 am
The drive-through holiday display at the Corvallis Pepsi plant will shine as brightly as ever this year, even though one of its guiding lights has gone out.
Alma Pastega, the wife of bottling company owner Mario Pastega, died Feb. 22 at the age of 90. The popular light show at the Pepsi plant was inspired by a similar display in her Northern California hometown, and Alma designed and painted many of the dozens of cartoon characters, storybook figures and seasonal decorations that have accumulated since the tradition began in 1981.
The elaborate, brightly painted construction wraps around three sides of the Pepsi complex in northeast Corvallis, and Mario Pastega said seeing it in place brings back fond memories of his wife of nearly 70 years.
"It feels like part of her is here," he said.
Pastega said his wife was a lifelong artist who loved painting new figures for the annual extravaganza, resting the wooden cutouts on sawhorses while she worked in the garage of their home.
But things didn't always work out as planned - like the time one of Alma's Siamese cats decided to pay her a visit in her makeshift studio.
"She's almost done, the paint's still wet, and the cat jumps up and slides from one end to the other," Pastega recalled. "She was so mad!"
Beginning this year, the annual display will be dedicated to the memory of Alma Pastega and two others who were instrumental in bringing it to life: Ole Brensdal and Ed Strowbridge. Visitors will be greeted by a new addition - a large wooden heart with a legend explaining their contributions to the project.
Brensdal, the plant's millwright and maintenance man for 26 years, was a mechanical wizard who constructed most of the items in the display, including a life-size figure of Santa Claus playing an organ. Brensdal scavenged parts from a decommissioned vending machine to make Santa's arms pump up and down.
"He was a true craftsman," Pastega said.
Brensdal retired from Pepsi-Cola of Corvallis in 2001 at the age of 83 and died in January 2007.
One of the largest and most elaborate constructions in the annual display, which depicts scenes from the Dr. Seuss classic "How the Grinch Stole Christmas," was created by Ed Strowbridge. The miniature Whoville adorned Strowbridge's west Corvallis yard for years, but when his health began to fail he donated it to Pastega, and it's been part of the Pepsi show ever since.
"He did the whole thing, and that's a very complicated one," Pastega said.
Strowbridge died in 2000.
Still, the show continues to evolve - and now new contributors are coming forward.
This year, for instance, the scenes from the "Twelve Days of Christmas" exhibit have been replaced with new paintings based on Alma's originals, which had been damaged by years of winter weather. The work was done by Dan Yates, a Hewlett-Packard employee who was looking for a way to volunteer in the community.
Pastega said he likes Yates' updated renderings of his wife's work.
"They're fresh," he said.
Today the light show is a beloved Corvallis tradition, drawing an estimated 40,000 visitors a year.
But it takes weeks of effort by Pepsi employees to set up and take down the holiday display each year, and storing the strings of lights, wooden figures and big mechanized exhibits takes up a lot of space in the company's downtown warehouse. Then there's all the maintenance involved in keeping everything functioning properly, not to mention the electricity to power all those lights (though the cost is partly offset by a donation from Pacific Power).
There's no charge to drive through the display, and Pastega says he doesn't want to ask for donations because it might keep poor families from coming.
So how much longer will the show continue to light up winter nights in Corvallis?
"As long as I'm around," Pastega promised.
Pepsi lights
WHAT: Holiday light show at the Corvallis Pepsi bottling plant, 2636 N.E. Belvue St. near Highway 99W and Walnut Boulevard.
WHEN: Opens Friday and runs through Dec. 28; hours are 5 to 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays.
COST: Free