Hoffman resident Cynthia Northcutt looks forward to the time each year when the whole town comes together to celebrate the holiday season and spread cheer to one another.

“This has become an annual event for us,” Northcutt said in the Hoffman Schoolhouse gymnasium Monday night. “I think everybody enjoys coming together and being together for another year, and I like to see people I haven’t seen in awhile. It’s just a wonderful, hometown feeling to be here.”

She was one of more than 100 people who joined the celebration Monday, which featured free pizza courtesy of Progress Energy, Santa Claus, door prizes, a “rocking around the Christmas tree” procession and a local choir.

Richmond Senior High Senior and Hoffman resident Courtney Collins is well aware this could be her last hometown Christmas celebration, with her living there anyway. Her college options have her considering a move to Greensboro to attend North Carolina A&T University.

“I love seeing everybody mingling, and just enjoying the Christmas season,” she said at the event.

Nine-year-old Antonio Isaac agreed.

“I like to celebrate stuff with a lot of people,” he patiently explained over the din of the crowd.

For Hoffman Mayor Jo Ann Jasper-Thomas and other town officials, the Christmas tree lighting “is a chance for us to serve the citizens of Hoffman, and show them how much we truly appreciate them.”

This year’s celebration, however, took them into uncharted waters as they bid farewell to the woman who made the Town of Hoffman a millionaire through her investments in the town’s name over the course of her 56-year career of public service.

Nann Bryant became the Hoffman Town Clerk in 1953, while America still had a World War II hero in the White House, in the form of President Dwight Eisenhower, and before Elvis Presley brought rock and roll to popularity through his television performances.

“We love her - she’s a wonderful person,” Thomas said Monday night.

Thomas explained the town’s wealth, at more than $1 million in assets, was amassed through Bryant’s purchases of certificates of deposits (CD’s), making projects like taking on the Hoffman Schoolhouse earlier this year a possibility for the town.

“I gave my life to it,” Bryant explained at the event.

She said “there’s been many a night when I worked until 2 a.m. on the business of the town.”

Bryant recounted how she took on her job with the town in the early 50’s, when her late husband, Don, was the mayor of the town. All the business of the Town of Hoffman was conducted from her home at that time, even the payment of taxes.

For Bryant, it was a good, long stint, and she’s ready for it to pass.

“I’m ready to move on,” she said.

After the Christmas celebration, Bryant swore in town officials in her last official act.

For five-year-old Hoffman resident Kerrington Clark, however, this drama went unnoticed. He was preoccupied by the presence of Santa Claus.

“I like being here because I want to get a new drum set for the Wii,” he said.

Staff Writer Philip D. Brown can be reached at (910) 997-3111 ext. 32, or by e-mail at pbrown@yourdailyjournal.com.