Brian Jones didn’t even know where Cleveland was when he purchased the Christmas Story House on eBay last year. “I had to look on MapQuest,” says the 30-year-old Californian. Jones was making a pretty good living manufacturing and selling leg lamps — like the one featured in the 1983 movie A Christmas Story — when he learned that the 111-year-old Tremont house where the film was shot was up for auction. He bought the house for $150,000.
Jones — who claims to have seen the movie “easily more than a hundred times” — has since sunk an additional $200,000 into the dwelling. Today, the house opens as a memento-stuffed museum that pays tribute to Jones’ all-time favorite movie. “If you would have passed it on the street, you wouldn’t have recognized it,” he says. “It needed a lot of work.” The renovation project includes everything from new wood siding to a 1940s-style porch. “I didn’t want this to be lost,” says Jones.
Wednesdays-Saturdays, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.; Sundays, 12-5 p.m., 2006
This article appears in Nov 22-28, 2006.