BY ROGER SMITH
MOUNTAIN CITIZEN
INEZ — Christmas in the Mountains opened Sunday evening with A Merry Little Christmas Party at the Collier Center, where the first Ms. and Mr. Christmas in the Mountains, Carolyn Horn and Charles Mills, were crowned.
“We’re going to see Martin County shine as bright as the sun,” festival planning committee member Brenda Davis said after recognizing the groups and individuals working on the event that runs through Saturday night in downtown Inez.
Martin County Judge/Executive Lon Lafferty spoke briefly, praising the organizers and Horn and Mills.
“Gatlinburg has nothing on you all,” Lafferty told the organizers. “It’s also an honor for me to be here tonight as we crown two true royalties of Martin County. That’s in Charles Mills and my good friend sitting right here. I love Carolyn so much.
“Charles has been such a blessing to this county, given his work in the medical field. The Lord only knows the number of people – the lives that he’s saved and the lives that his work has impacted … He’s someone that I look to as a man of God and a spiritual warrior.”
The judge said Horn was one of his top advisers during his previous term as county judge and could be “the mother of the century.”
Horn is a lifelong Martin County resident and was elected circuit clerk in 1969. She served 30 years while raising her four children.
“Ms. Carolynn – if you know her well, you know that she does not sit still for very long. It seems like every time I talk to her, she is here, there and everywhere, and it’s nice to know that it’s not just now, but it’s always been that way,” said Inez First Baptist Church pastor Derek Catron.
Horn, 83, accepted Christ the same year she was announced valedictorian of her class, according to Catron.
Ms. Christmas in the Mountains
“Martin County has my heart,” Horn said after being crowned. “My children would drag me out of here tomorrow if they could and drag me down to central Kentucky, but that’s been a very difficult thing and going to get harder every day. This is my home, this is my county, and these are the people I love with all my heart.”
Horn likened the Christmas in the Mountains committee to Enoch and how inspired he was and how the king of Persia allowed him to go on to build a wall and accomplish things.
“He wasn’t part of it, the king,” said Horn. “And I thought to myself how they took this … and when the Lord gave it to them, they didn’t back down. They started, as they were telling you earlier tonight, with the ‘Light Up a Cross for Christmas,’ and from that, look what it’s grown into.”
Horn told party-goers that they were becoming part of the growth of Christmas in the Mountains.
“By coming to these events, you’re supporting them; you’re giving them the opportunity to make it bigger and better each and every year,” said Horn. “And our children will remember these things.”
Horn’s focus turned to Proverbs 22:6: “Bring up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”
“My children were all raised in Inez First Baptist Church,” she said. “I’m not trying to do an infomercial for Inez First Baptist Church. We have so many good churches across this county and across this community. That just happens to be where God saved me at 18 years old. And oh, what a failure I was through the years. You sometimes wish you could go back, but then it’s not a faith journey. I’m so glad that he taught me in those times when I was low and down in the dumps, so to speak. He was teaching me each and every moment.”
Horn introduced her children and asked them to stand.
“My oldest is Leslie and with her is her husband, Mike,” said Horn.
Leslie is a cosmetic dental surgeon.
“My second, my only son and the one they all say is the favorite – now I didn’t say that; they say that – is EJ and his wife JonAnn and my grandson Austin Horn.”
EJ is an OBGYN surgeon.
The matriarch joked about her grandson, “You better be careful who you’re talking to. He’s a reporter for the Lexington Herald. Be very, very careful.”
Next was Nancy, “who is the baby,” and her son Jordan.
Nancy is a pharmacist.
“Then I have one more that is the ‘real’ baby, that’s not the real baby,” said Horn, introducing daughter Claria Boom and her husband, Denny Boom.”
Claria is a federal judge.
After reading a Christmas poem penned in 1971 by John Hardin, Horn recognized her husband, Junior Horn.
“I want to tell you something about their daddy,” she said. “He’s really proud of all his children, but the thing that he’s most proud of his children for is that they never forgot where they came from.”
Mr. Christmas in the Mountains
Mills, a lifelong resident of Martin County, accepted his crowning as Mr. Christmas in the Mountains, even though he initially did not want it.
After putting the crown on Mills’ head, planning committee member Brenda Davis said, “When informed of this recognition, he certainly was surprised and felt that he did not deserve the honor. Being a humble man who has never sought any type of spotlight, Charles wanted to decline, but his wife Rita strongly encouraged him to accept.”
Mills is the youngest of 14 siblings born to Fred and Cora Mills. In 1965, he married Billie Jean Stepp, who taught in the county for 30 years and deceased in 1996. They had one child, Donna Mills Fitch, now a retired Martin County teacher. In 1999, Charles married Rita Hunt, a Pike County teacher and a self-employed accountant.
“Since he became a Christian at age 17, Charles has lived a consistent life of holiness,” said Davis.
Mills has served various roles in the Turkey Creek Church of the Nazarene.
“Being musically talented, he has shared his gifts as a church pianist, organist, guitarist and singer over a span of more than 50 years.”
Mills has traveled with a local quartet and served as a youth leader for over 20 years. He has been a faithful member of his church leadership team and committees for over 60 years.
As a charter member of Martin County Home Health, Mills was instrumental in establishing home health services in Martin County.
Mills was a charter member of both Appalachia Reach Out and Christian Appalachia Homes, a shelter for battered women and children. He was involved for many years as an active member of the board of directors for each organization.
For more than 20 years, Mills opened his home weekly for a prayer group and has participated in Martin County SAVE meetings through the years.
Mills was an employee of the Martin County CETA (Comprehensive Employment and Training Act) program, U.S. Postal Service, Brandon Wells Pharmacy for 20 years and Inez Drugstore for another 20 years. His retirement at age 75 freed him to enjoy his farm on Mills Ridge on Turkey Creek, where he often welcomes relatives and friends for memorial visits. He also hosts an annual September family reunion of the Mills clan with attendees numbering in the hundreds.
“This man knows how to pray,” said Davis, a member of Mills’ prayer cell for 13 years.
“That taught me how to pray and seek God … Martin County is privileged to have this great patriarchal faith of Charles Mills, Mr. Christmas in the Mountains.”
