Darwin and Opal Brown

Mr. and Mrs. Claus

When Darwin E. Brown passed away in February of 1978 at the age of 79, the end of an era had occurred. Like many notable citizens who receive attention from newspapers and chroniclers of the past, Brown had not been involved in local politics or a prominent businessman, two areas of civic life that typically attract the historian’s gaze and pen when someone dies. No, Brown had been a beloved character, known to thousands of Kalamazoo children and their parents, who every December donned the heavy, red and white costume that would come to define his later years.

Darwin Elmer Brown was born on 13 November 1898 to Delbert and Adah Brown in Van Buren County, Michigan. Not long after graduating from high school, Darwin married Opal Elizabeth Graves on 20 December 1919. Opal worked as a teacher after attending Western Normal School. She cleverly exploited her husband’s talents, employing him as both Santa Claus and “Brownie the Clown,” to entertain her young students. Brown would take his love of performance and character acting on the road as a member of the Shrine Circus, performing coast to coast at “fairs, carnivals, variety shows and civic promotions.” He was also known for many years as the “voice of the Allegan County Fair.”

But for local kids who grew up in Kalamazoo during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, many will recall the Brown’s for their roles as the adorable couple from the North Pole, which they reprised each year from 1955 to 1977 at the Gilmore Brothers Department Store. Each holiday season, the Brown’s would dress in their best costume apparel, and meet a parade of excited children on the department store’s fifth floor. After the children would tell Santa Claus what they wanted as a gift for Christmas, Mrs. Claus would hand them a candy cane. Darwin had grown weary of traveling for work by the 1950s, and so he sought to spend more time on his Gobles farm. After reaching out to Irving S. Gilmore and inquiring about their need for a professional Santa Claus, Gilmore provided the couple a trial run. Gilmore was so charmed by the couple, he continued to support them financially for years, even putting them up in a downtown hotel during their six-week term so that they didn’t have to drive back and forth from Gobles to Kalamazoo.

Opal Brown passed away in 1998 while residing in Florida. The Brown’s are buried together in the Robinson Cemetery in Gobles, Michigan, where the couple lived for most of their life.

Article written by Ryan Gage, Kalamazoo Public Library staff, June 2026