This is nearly crunch time for Kriss Kringle, so you can imagine there are a lot of things he needs help with, especially answering the letters he receives from boys and girls from all over the world.
Recently, WTOP became aware of a local man the North Pole commissioned to answer some of those letters for Old Saint Nick.
In what is truly a holiday miracle, Michael Kim of Clarksburg, Maryland, was once a nonbeliever.
Kim’s journey to becoming one of Santa’s little helpers started along with his sister at Landover Mall in the ’70s.
“We saw a Santa Claus mailbox,” Kim said. “She said, ‘You could write to Santa Claus.’”
With no doubt in his mind, Kim told his sister, “Santa’s not real.”
Kim’s sister told him that if he writes, Santa will respond.
When Kim got home, he wrote Santa a letter, asking for a G.I. Joe action figure, Hot Wheels and a Steve Austin “The Six Million Dollar Man” doll.
“Six days later, I got a letter,” Kim said. “I said, ‘What? He’s real?’”
That made Kim a lifelong believer. In 2017, after his mother passed away, he thought about something she had said.
“Don’t just live in a community, make an impact,” Kim recalled.
After getting permission from the North Pole, Kim put an official Santa Claus mailbox on his front porch and let parents know he would be answering letters for the jolly one.
“That first year, I did over 600 letters,” Kim said.
In the personalized letters Kim sends back, he includes Santa’s tips on staying off the naughty list.
Along with including stamps, Kim asks parents to drop off cans of food that go to the Clarksburg pantry along with the letters for Santa.
When asked what he thinks as he reads the letters for Santa, Kim laughed when he replied: “Parents better get a second loan because the list is amazing, and it adds up.”
Luckily, Santa is always around to help.
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