Ed
Butchart was born and raised in Guilford County, North Carolina.
He attended North Carolina State University and graduated from
the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. He was
commissioned an officer in the United States Marine Corps,
served 22 years on active duty, and retired. Following
retirement from the military, he worked briefly as a broadcast
engineer and then sold medical diagnostics products for ten
years. During that time he befriended some people with
disabilities and in 1986 he and his wife, Annie, incorporated his helping efforts as
Friends of Disabled Adults, Inc. (FODA). They were a
loving, unstoppable team until Annie died, ironically, on
Christmas Day 2004.
Ed started full time
ministry on May 1, 1987. He attended Atlanta Christian College,
obtained a Bachelor of Theology degree, and was ordained into
the ministry in May of 1989. You can learn about FODA at the
organization's web site.
You can read about Ed’s coming to the role
of Santa in his book, “Red Suit Diaries,” which is available at
any book store. It is also available as an audio book on CD and
cassettes. An excerpt is available on this website on
Santa's Books page.
After two years as a mall Santa, Ed was
asked by Stone
Mountain Park to be their Santa and he has been there every
year since 1991.
His work with disabled children and adults
has earned him a lot of recognition and media time. He has been
featured on the Today Show three times and on NBC Nightly
News. He has been on many syndicated TV and radio shows and on
all local Atlanta TV stations. He has also been in USAToday,
Christianity Today, Southern Living and many other newspapers
and magazines. People come from all over Georgia and from
surrounding states year after year to visit what they consider
to be the closest thing to a “real Santa” anywhere.
We hope you will enjoy your visit here to
this virtual Santa.
