Visit the Accidental Santa web site at AccidentalSanta.org

On December 12th, 2006, I started getting phone calls from children who wanted to give their Christmas wish list to Santa Claus. Santa Claus? Let me explain. In November, 2006, I launched a phone number for this web site 1-800-SantaBarbara and it turns out that it is one digit off from 1-800-SantaClaus. Kids from all over the country were misdialing and reaching me by mistake. This was not a problem for me. In fact I loved taking the calls from kids. I didn't promise them that they would receive the toys ("you have to ask your mommy or daddy first!") but I did play along and become Santa. This continued for a week and the number of calls increased every day. One day my mom suggested I tell my little Santa story to the Santa Barbara News-Press. I was interviewed by Kimberly Pohas at the News-Press, but never expected it would make the paper.

What happened after that is pretty much unbelievable.

I woke up the next morning from a call from Matt McAllister of the Early Show on KTYD asking for a live interview about the Santa story (I guess it made the paper!) That was followed by a visit from three local TV stations. Next, radio stations from around the country started calling. My Santa story then made the Associated Press and was published in papers all over the country. Finally, the major cable news networks started running the story hour on the hour. I then was ask to do a live interview on MSNBC, two live interviews on Fox News Channel (E.D. Hill & Brian Wilson) and a live interview on CNN. CNN even brought their satellite truck to my home and did a live broadcast from my living room on Christmas Eve. Meanwhile the calls increase to 100 per day then to 100 per hour when kids started calling my number directly to speak to Santa Claus. I loved getting the calls and would talk to children from the moment I woke up, until the moment I went to bed. I'm still not sure why the story got as much attention as it did, but it was fun to be part of it.

When it was all over, 4666 children called my number and left voice messages. I personally spoke to an additional 973 children who were able to reach me. Tens of thousands more called and couldn't get through my very jammed phone line.

                                                                   - John Dickson