'Santa Scott' Finds Full-Time 2018 Home In Bucks (ICYMI)

FAIRLESS HILLS, PA — Santa Scott, Bucks County's unconventional, and beloved, Santa for more than two decades, has found a place to call home.

After being released last year at Oxford Valley Mall, where a photo company said it wanted to move toward a more traditional Saint Nick for its photos, Santa Scott — also know as 51-year-old Scott Diethorne — will be available for photos every weekend through Christmas at Fairless Hills Garden Center.

"We knew Scott was a perfect fit for us," said Gary Steinberg, owner of the garden center at 620 Lincoln Hwy. in Fairless Hills. "Both Scott and I love to provide customers with what they want — whether that's seasonal home and garden supplies or showing off and having fun to put a smile on children's faces."

Santa Scott will have his own custom-built set at the garden center, decked out with Christmas decorations, poinsettias, Christmas cactus and more. Photo packages will be available starting at $19.99. Details of his schedule can be found on the Fairless Hills Garden Center Facebook page.

In a Facebook post in September, Diethorne wrote that he was let go by the company that runs the Santa program at Oxford Valley Mall (not the mall itself, he noted) because "I was not their type of Santa and I was not professional enough for them."

In a statement to Patch last year, Cherry Hill Programs, which runs the Santa program at Oxford Valley, defended the changes.

"During this special time of year, we are focused on delivering a magical holiday experience," the statement said. "We remain dedicated to preserving the tradition and image of Santa with authentic holiday visits for every guest to our programs. We uphold the magic of the one and only Santa for all believers, by providing a consistent approach at every experience we operate, not just Oxford Valley Mall."

A Pennsburg native and career truck driver, Diethorne is no stranger to making children happy. He's a father of nine children and grandfather of 10 who has built up a local following over the past two decades or so.

Some loyal fans ask Santa Scott to flash the "Naughty" and "Nice" tattoos he had inked into his forearms. Others ask for crazy poses — picking up young children and dangling them by their ankles is a favorite. And he's always made a point of hosting at least one "pet night," posing with four-legged friends like cats and dogs as well as more exotic pets like snakes and lizards.

The left-field approach has worked. Santa Scott has become so popular he's had to create three different pages on Facebook after he hit the site's limit for number of friends on his first.
Take a look at "Santa Scott" showing off his new set in the Facebook video below:

Photo courtesy "Santa Scott." Used with permission.