There is a long-standing tradition here in Eureka Springs involving
the annual kidnapping of Baby Jesus from the nativity scene in the band
shell at Basin Springs Park. I've naturally been aware of the happenings
the last couple of Xmases, but I had the luck to be sitting in the Little
Beaver yesterday afternoon when Randy, the Peace Frog guy, acted as
the archival raconteur and kept us spellbound with a fairly complete
history of this tradition.

In fact, it was Randy who served Virginia Voiers her fourth (count them)
martini just before her grandkids dared her to take the baby three or
four years ago. She had been telling them that the blue-eyed, blond-haired
statue was inappropriate because Jesus was a dark-skinned, hooked-nose,
black-haired Jew. This 70-year-old grandma took the dare. She's even
a member of the sorority which sponsors the nativity.

Virginia Voiers, a 70-year-old grandmother, has been charged with stealing baby Jesus from a nativity scene in Eureka Springs, Arkansas.

"It was a lark, it wasn't any serious stealing,'' Voiers told the Lovely County Citizen newspaper of Eureka Springs. "My granddaughter commented that no one had taken the baby Jesus this year and said, 'Grandma?' I said, 'Oh, what the heck.''' Usually, the baby Jesus is returned by the thief. Voiers said her Saturday caper was the first time she'd taken anything from the nativity. "I didn't know we had a tattletale downtown,'' said Voiers, who is also a Sunday school teacher at a Methodist church.

She got caught because a security camera had been installed to catch pranksters in the act. In other words, the entire theft was filmed. I'd love to see that video.

Last year the baby was stolen by someone much younger and less kind.
The baby was painted with swastikas before it was found.

ES Folk just reached Virginia Voiers, the baby-Jesus nabber of national repute.

She is going to be on TV this evening, December 5, 2008, either the 5 or the 6 o’clock news on KY3. Interviewer Linda Russell said she didn’t know which time, although it would probably be at 6.

With her usual liveliness, Voiers said, “I think it’s funny they’re interviewing me for something I didn’t do.” –This year, at any rate.

Voiers nabbed the baby Jesus three years ago from the nativity scene at Basin Park; and although she wasn’t the first– there had been quite a tradition that had grown up of nabbings– she was the first to get national attention.

It was too much– a granny-nabber no less– and Voiers made her national TV debut– along with being fined $75.

She’s given up nabbing she says, but “I know a really good lawyer,” she tells us.

Voiers also says she hopes the baby is returned. “They should take the baby back,” she says. “Nabbing is one thing, stealing is another. It’s meant to be a prank.”

And a report from last year:

The blonde-haired, blue-eyed, baby Jesus has been liberated again this year from its Basin Park mooring in a Eureka Springs nativity scene that has become a target of holiday pranks from many Christmases past.

The most noteworthy nab came from 70-year old Virginia Voiers who was tempted by her granddaughter to continue the tradition. She made national TV.

As might be expected in Eureka, the town soon lined up, vehemently pro and con, after carriage man Tom Tharpe reported the theft.

One of the most indignant was the sorority which had originally sponsored the scene. They raised money to install a video camera to catch future culprits in flagrante delicto.

It didn’t work. Nor did the concrete block the baby was tied to keep it from being stolen again this year.

The video camera caught someone in a grey hoodie but that’s all.

Detective Morris Pate, who has ruined his career as a credible police witness because of evidence he had that did not reach the court in the City’s case against the Hell’s Angels, has now become the stolen baby spokesperson for the cop shop– er, make that for the majority of Eureka residents.

Pate has been quoted in the AR Dem Gazette, saying that those who think the prank is funny are in the minority.

He and Mayor Dani Joy, along with once-Council candidate Mickey Schneider, seem to have incredible abilities to read majority public opinion, they all three claim.

Schneider lost a run for Council; the people of Eureka are beginning to catch on to Joy. And now Pate, having lost legal credibility, chines in with his reading of the nabbing.

You'll note the mention of the baby being chained to a cinder block.
This year it's bolted to the stage. Kinda reminiscent of nailing the
poor guy to a cross, huh?

Two years ago after the kidnapping a, naturally, a collective anxiety
of a couple of days, an anonymous caller alerted the police that
the babe could be found at the local McDonalds. Indeed he was.
He was found cuddled in Ronald's outstretched arm.

This year, as you see in the Police Beat report above, the baby is
hooked up with a car alarm as well. "They" are just taking all the
fun out of Christmas.

Then again, I found a quote in a Wikipedia article about such:

"It's just wrong to steal the baby Jesus."

A pot of leek and potato soup is just finishing up on the stove.

And I'm heading back down to the village in a bit to shepherd a
dog from the Good Shepherd Humane Society in the Xmas parade.
We'll be next to last in the parade just before Santa's float.
Click into the web cam to watch. Just guessing, but we should be
down in the web cam coverage of Spring Street at about 6:15 or so.

The baby His Very Self: