Everyone Believed

Floyd Kline, who was Santa Bud for almost 60 years, symbolically passes his toy bag to protege Chris Brezler. Credit: Amy and Mark Cullember

As the holiday season approaches, Hagerstown pays tribute to Santa Bud as a new era begins

By Lisa Gregory

During the early 1990s 2-year-old Katie Delaportas was at Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore for a 12-week hospital stay. “I had taken my son to see Santa Bud,” says says Katie’s mom, Kathy Delaportas, who was living in Boonsboro at the time. “And I asked if there was any way possible for him to come see my daughter in the hospital.”  

In typical Santa Bud fashion, he was eager to oblige. “After several phone calls clearing it with the hospital and security it was arranged,” says Delaportas.

Credit: Snips and Snails Photography

Santa Bud not only visited with Katie but with every single child in the ward. “Gifts were given,” says Delaportas. “Many photos were taken. He took pictures with all the staff. The front security guard was beaming in his photo. The magic in the ward on that evening was tangible. Everyone believed.” 

If you grew up in the Hagerstown area, you grew up with Santa Bud. For 57 years Floyd “Bud” Kline as Santa Bud made appearances at businesses such as his own family business, Kline’s Auto Body, as well as churches, hospitals, and private homes bringing joy to countless children, including generations of children in the same family. Kline himself estimated that more than 500,000 children had sat on his lap and shared their Christmas wishes with him.  

Kline’s journey as Santa Bud began in 1966 when he dressed up as the jolly old elf to sell Christmas trees at a gas station he owned. A little boy with special needs came by with his family. The little boy couldn’t speak but clung to Kline saying, “ho, ho.” The moment touched Kline deeply and years later he couldn’t speak about it without tears coming to his eyes.  

“He loved being Santa,” says his daughter, Debby Kendrick. “He touched so many lives.” 

So naturally in his later years, Kline began to worry who would continue to spread Christmas joy when he no longer could. And last December, days after he had made his last appearance as Santa Bud, Kline did, in fact, pass away at the age of 86. Kline had been suffering with heart and kidney problems, according to Kendrick. The beloved Santa, says Kendrick, had nearly 1,000 people pay their respects after his death.  

But Kline, a man of deep faith, didn’t leave this earth without a plan. “He would say to me, ‘I’m getting old,’” says Chris Brezler, a longtime family friend. “He truly worried about people not having a Santa.” 

During one such conversation, Brezler, who had grown up in the “same neighborhood as Santa” from the age of 10, reassured him that he would step up when needed. “I told him don’t worry,’” says Brezler. “I’ll take care of it for you.’” 

That last Christmas season proved to be especially challenging for Kline. However, Kendrick says he was hesitant to go to the hospital. She was persistent. “I kept telling him,” says Kendrick, “if you want to play Santa Clause, you’re going to have to listen to me and go to the hospital.” He finally agreed.  

Credit: Snips and Snails Photography

Kline desperately wanted to keep being Santa Bud, pushing through pain and fatigue to do so. For example, “He had an ulcer on his leg,” says Kendrick. “He was upset because he had to wear sneakers instead of his boots. I told him, ‘Daddy, they’re not going to look at your shoes.’ ”

The boots mattered.  

Authenticity was key to Kline. No one knows that better than Brezler. As Santa’s protégé, he was instructed in all things Santa. “You just can’t look like Santa,” he remembers Santa Bud telling him. “You have to be Santa.” The Santa suit, for example, “Couldn’t be mall Santa red, but a deep red or a maroon,” says Brezler.  

The color wasn’t the only thing Kline didn’t like about mall Santas. “He didn’t like the idea of an assembly line of sitting on Santa’s knee, taking a picture and on to the next kid,” says Brezler, who is a supervisor with the City of Hagerstown Water Department in his other life. “He told me, ‘There are kids with special needs who need a bit of time. Or you might be a kid who has lost a parent or lost a brother or sister, and you need some time. They need Santa.’” 

Sometimes their parents needed him as well. Brezler witnessed this firsthand. 

Credit: Amy and Mark Cullember 

Brezler recalls that his wife worked with a woman who was diagnosed with terminal cancer. She had a special wish. “Her son would never sit on Santa’s lap, and she always wanted that moment,” says Brezler.  

Santa Bud had an idea. “He told me to have her son write Santa a letter,” says Brezler. The boy did just that and the woman gave the letter to Brezler’s wife and Brezler gave it to Santa Bud. During a Santa Bud event after all the children had their photos taken and left, “The kid is all the way on the other side of the room and won’t go anywhere near Santa,” says Brezler.  

That’s when Santa Bud reached under his chair and pulled out the letter. “It had these stickers on it that the kid had colored and put on the letter,” Brezler says. Santa Bud said to the boy, “Is this your letter? Come over here and help me read this.”  

“Of course, the kid comes over and he’s talking to Santa Bud and standing beside him,” says Brezler. Safe to say, the boy eventually ended up on Santa’s lap. “His mother was in tears watching her son,” says Brezler. “Bud just had that magic.” 

Brezler was witness to more lighthearted Santa Bud encounters as well. “We were down at Ocean City sitting on the benches outside,” recalls Brezler. “A kid comes out of a store crying. Maybe he didn’t get the toy he wanted.” 

The little boy saw Kline sitting there with Brezler and stopped in his tracks. “Bud motions the little boy to come over to him,” says Brezler. “The kid immediately stops crying.” 

The mother accompanied the boy over to where Kline was sitting. “I had to take a trip down here because of you,” Kline said to the boy. “I heard you were being naughty.” 

According to Brezler, Kline then told the boy,” We’ve got plenty of time to put this in the right direction before Christmas. Do you think you can get it going in the right direction?” 

The kid nodded his head yes. “The little boy and mom start walking down the boardwalk and this kid keeps turning around, looking at Bud, to see if he was still there,” says Brezler with a chuckle. “Bud could slip in and out of that persona on a whim.”  

Brezler all the while was learning from the master. He remembers visiting Kline in the hospital as he prepared to cover a scheduled event for Santa Bud last December. It would be the first time Brezler would don the Santa suit and step in for Kline. And Kline was leaving nothing to chance.   

“They’re getting ready to wheel him down for more tests,” says Brezler. But not before he imparted upon Brezler some last-minute instructions on being Santa. “The nurse said, ‘Mr. Kline we have to go,’” says Brezler. “And he was like, ‘Hold on I got to tell him something. I got to finish this.’  I told the nurse, ‘You’re going to have to let him finish because he’s not going to be happy unless you do.’” 

Instructions given, Brezler said goodbye as Kline was wheeled away. “I said, ‘Alright, Pap, I got it,” he says. “We’ll make sure it’s taken care of. I’ll swing by when I’m done on Saturday.” 

Kline as Santa Bud at the Wilson Store in Clear Spring last year. Credit: Snips and Snails Photography.

That Saturday morning as he readied himself for his appearance as Santa, Brezler got a phone call. It was Kline’s grandson. “He told me Bud was gone,” says Brezler.  

Brezler remembers turning to his wife and saying, “What am I going to do now?” To which she responded, “You know what you have to do.” 

Brezler put on his Santa suit.  

Later at the Wilson Old Country Store in Clear Spring, where he was being Santa, a little girl came in and randomly ran up to him and gave him a big hug. “She didn’t sit on my lap or even speak to me,” he says. “She just gave me a hug and then ran back to her mother. I told her, ‘You have no idea how much Santa needed that hug.’” 

With Kline now gone, Brezler has the blessing of the Kline family to continue his legacy, including Kline’s wife Doris, who often was Mrs. Santa Clause. “We tell him, ‘Daddy is smiling down on you,’” says Kendrick.  

He certainly has the blessing of the man himself.  

There is a photo that Brezler holds dear. “It was the first time I wore the Santa suit, and it was the last time Bud was Santa,” he says. In the photo Santa Bud is handing the toy bag over to Brezler. Passing the torch, if you will. 

“I’ll never be able to fill his boots,” says Brezler, “but I can walk in his footsteps.”