Christmas in the Park began with a nativity scene that Don Lima built in the 1950s outside his family’s mortuary in Willow Glen. It grew year by year, and in the 1970s he gave the displays to the city. The event moved to the Plaza de César Chávez in the early 1980s. In 2011, when the city could no longer pay for it, a nonprofit took it over.
Each season more than 500 Christmas trees decorated by schools and local groups fill the plaza, along with dozens of animated displays and a 55-foot Community Giving Tree. The nonprofit says the free event draws more than a million guests a season. In 2020 it became a drive-through at History Park.