NY Family Breaks World Record For Christmas Lights
A family in upstate New York has broken their own Guinness World Record for most Christmas lights at their home. According to the Albany Times-Union, the Gay family of Lagrangeville first set the record in 2012 with over 346,283 Christmas lights on a residential property. They broke their own record in 2014 with 601,736 lights. And they’ve topped themselves again this year.
Tim Gay and his family broke the record again with a whopping 687,000 lights in their annual ERDAJT Holiday Lights Display, which opened this year on November 26th and runs through December 28th. By the way, each initial in ERDAJT comes from Tim’s three kids’ (Emily, Daniel, and John) first and middle names. They come home on weekends to help their dad set it all up every year beginning in September.
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Many of the lights are synchronized with music. Tim is an engineer for IBM so he’s good at that sort of thing. But he and his family don’t do this just for fun. The annual extravaganza also serves as a fundraiser for local charities, and the family says they hope to collect $500,000 with this year’s display.
There’s a good chance the Gay family will hit their fundraising goal. On some nights, the ERDAJT Holiday Lights Display draws over 1,000 cars. It has even served as the backdrop for nearly 20 marriage proposals. Here’s what it looks like driving through the record-setting display: