Nativity display

Many people collect nativity scenes and sometimes there are few in our collection that hold a special place. Maybe it’s a family heirloom or perhaps acquired from an artist from a faraway place.
 
But few people end up with 575 nativities in their collection like Garrick and Ginger Hyde of Williston. Garrick has been the president of CHI St. Alexius Health there for nearly two years.
 
The Hydes will share their collection as a holiday gift to the community once again this year. The World Nativities in Williston event runs from Dec. 10-Dec. 18 in the medical library. Attendees can enjoy a guided tour of 100 handmade nativities from around the world. 
 
The nativities are just a portion of the Hydes collection that they gathered over the past 20 years while doing humanitarian work that began in 2005 when Garrick’s mother found a unique nativity scene in China.
 
“The project started when my mother went to China to teach English in a university there,” Garrick explained. “While there, she went on an excursion with some other teachers to a workshop of Chinese Christian artisans in a rural province. She saw their beautiful wood carvings including a nativity from a Chinese perspective. She was really impressed and bought as many as she could fit into her luggage. She gifted those nativity scenes to us for Christmas in 2004.”
 
Garrick notes that here was an inscription on the nativity of Isaiah 9:2 that talks of a Messiah bringing great light. “The people who walk in darkness will see a great light; Those who live in a dark land, the light will shine on them.”

“I was impressed that they were writing scripture, quoting Old Testament and prophets. It was so unique and different to what I was used to and what most Americans are used to seeing, the kind we buy in stores,” he said.
 
Garrick and his wife were working and raising their children in Utah at the time. He just kept thinking about that nativity gifted from his mom, even after the holidays. While driving down the freeway in 2005, his thoughts turned into inspiration.
 
“Maybe it was sort of a conversation with God or just in my own head, I’m not sure. It was just that inner voice that led me to feel this very strong desire to help this group of artisans with their trade,” Garrick explained. “I started to think about how I could get in contact with the artists who really have no way to market their materials, especially at that time with the internet in China. It was a very different time. I thought that maybe I could place an order and put some money in their pockets, help them out.”
 
Then, after talking things over with his wife and four young children, they had a very strong desire telling them to do a lot more. 
 
“I heard this internal voice, ‘you need to actually import their items and help them by selling their work for them.’ When this idea first came into my head, I had a very strong negative reaction. I’m a healthcare administrator, I don’t know anything about importing or online sales; everything about it was what I knew nothing about. As I’m having this inspiration driving down the freeway and a mental debate, I started to hear, ‘you don’t have to know how to do this, you just have to be willing and, if you’re willing, God will help you.’”
 
The project beginning 
 
It quickly turned into a family project. Then, Garrick said they got really brave and placed a bulk order working through a translator in China, who happened to be one of his mother’s English learning students. Soon, the big shipment arrived at their home. 
 
Garrick and his family began taking photos and listing nativities for sale on eBay. Their children wrote personal notes and drew pictures to those who purchased the nativities. They weren’t looking to make money. They were just thinking of the service aspect of it. 
 
“We still thought it would be very temporary,” Garrick said. “We figured we’d sell a few nativities, put some money in these 26 artisans’ pockets, pat ourselves on the back and say, ‘we’re done.’ Then, I started having vivid dreams at night about artisans in other countries. One of the most vivid dreams was about artisans in Mongolia. I could see their faces and knew that I needed to find them and help them. Those were very strange dreams. I knew nothing about Mongolia. I thought, how in the world am I going to go find these people. Well, if I’m supposed to do this, then the inspiration will come. I wrote a letter to someone who just happened to be the perfect person and was able to connect me with those artisans.”
 
Then, other countries came on board. They had an opportunity to help artists in Nepal and then African countries; then, artisans in Latin American countries joined the effort. 
 
“It all started to just basically drop in our laps,” he said. “We didn’t really do anything to promote it because I was busy with a demanding job and young family. We weren’t going to keep any money.”
 
Any profits would go back to the artists or to a charity such as a school or orphanage in impoverished countries. The family was actually reluctant to let it grow. He said, “We had our doubts and concerns. Did we have enough time and were we able to fund this?”
 
Garrick said it truly was an opportunity to see God’s hand in all of this. “I’d just be having a conversation with someone about the project and through a very detailed series of events a person would talk to someone, who would talk to someone else, who knew someone else who had been to a country and met an artisan and got their contact information that would connect us. It was people that really needed help.”
 
These weren’t artists who had big followings. They are people in very difficult economic situations who had no way to market anything. Some were people just trying to make supplemental income for their family to have clothes, food and medical care. 
 
“Our goal was to really help anyone who wanted the help. After Mongolia, we’re growing instead of shrinking with this little service project so, at that point, when we saw the demand and how viable it was, we started our own website,” he said.
 
They didn’t have any selection criteria. Anyone who made the connection and wanted the help to market their nativity scenes joined in. They started commissioning nativities and collecting a remarkable number of handmade creations that include nativities made of clay, corn husks, coconuts, wire, wool, beads and reclaimed metal—just about every creative material you can imagine including one created from spare car parts with the Baby Jesus made from the spark plug.
 
“The only criteria we put into place was that artists represent the nativity according to their own culture,” Garrick stated. “We didn’t want to control the creative process. We want the artist to do what they felt inspired to do. The artists were used to the customer dictating the direction. But we wanted the artist to make it ethnic to their culture and put their own inspiration into it.”
 
This guiding principle has helped them to stay true to the art. 
 
“We’ve worked with 550 artisans in 56 countries now,” Garrick said. “Not all at the same time, of course. We were careful to not let any artisans become reliant on just our purchases.” 
 
He would also help some of the artists market themselves through social media or other online shops like Etsy. “So, our website became more of a referral point than a purchase point by telling the artists’ stories. As the internet became more advanced in some of these countries, the website would help the customer connect directly with the artist. Now, these artists have a thriving business of their own. We were just shining a mirror on what the artist does and connecting the customer and artist.”
 
The website, worldnativity.com, has changed over time and is now quite pared down from what it once was. But since 2005, they have sold more than 10,000 nativities from hundreds of artists across the globe. 
 
“At its height, we had 50 products for sale from about 20 different countries,” Garrick noted. “Now, it’s evolved and there’s less time to devote. The pandemic was also very hard on the project. Shipping was delayed or disrupted. People weren’t traveling to deliver. It was especially difficult to get items from remote countries. When we came back after waiting out the pandemic, we found out that some of the artists were forced to hang up their artistic work and go to work in other places to provide for their families and they got used to having a regular paycheck instead of an artist’s commission. What we’ve done has changed in the last few years. We have very little inventory. Now, we share our collection with the public to tell our story, teach about the artists and the inspiration behind it all.”
 
Tours in their home
 
The Hydes moved here from Maine for Garrick’s job. He and his wife, Ginger, are “empty nesters” now—three children grown with families of their own and one attending college. This is just the second year of the display at the hospital in Williston and all are invited to come and take a tour.
 
“Where we’ve lived before, we used to do tours in our home of the nativities,” he explained. “We’d have the whole main floor of our house set up with 100 nativities. It became very popular. We’d put a schedule up on our website. It was free, but people had to make an appointment because of the crowds. We’d do three tours a day, every day in December. It was a big investment of time for us. We’d limit it to 25 people per tour, but we’d have the whole month’s schedule full in just the first couple days.”
 
They did tours in their home for seven years. 
 
“Our carpets and furniture were completely ruined,” he joked, “but it was good. I calculated in all those seven years that we had 8,400 people walk through our home for nativity tours.”
 
They have set up displays in many different places. They have also collaborated on exhibits with churches and museums around the country. Upon taking the job at the Williston hospital, Garrick found great space that had become available when an old medical library was renovated. It has a whole wall of shelves that is perfect for displaying the nativities.
 
Of the 575 nativities in their personal collection, they have divided it into about 135 different ones in each grouping that would cover about a four-year rotation so each year’s display will feature entirely new and different nativities from last year’s.
 
If you go
 
The display at CHI St. Alexius Health in Williston is an exhibit of 100 handmade nativities from Africa, Asia and Latin America on display from Dec. 10-18. Tours are available weekdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 6 to 8 p.m. Weekend tours are Saturday, Dec. 14 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and Sunday, Dec. 15 from 5 to 8 p.m. Use the hospital main entrance and you will be directed to the medical library. Times are subject to change in the case of inclement weather. Check the hospital’s Facebook page (CHI St. Alexius Health Williston Medical Center) for updates.