Breakfast with Santa Event in Southeast Raleigh Brings Community Together

The neighborly tradition called “Breakfast with Santa” got its start in the 1960s, offering food and merriment to the Southeast Raleigh community, activist Octavia Rainey recalls.

Rainey and a community group are keeping the event going, with the celebration for this year set for ten a.m. to one p.m. Saturday, December 16, at the Tarboro Road Community Center, 121 North Tarboro Road. It’s sponsored by the North Central Citizens Advisory Council.

“Breakfast with Santa was started in the early ’60s by my grandmother, Sarah Rainey, and other neighbors,” she said. “The goal was to bring the community together.”

The breakfast is free and open to the public.

“Santa will arrive at eleven thirty a.m with gifts for kids and adults as long as they last,” Rainey said.