Community Wide Easter Egg Hunt Saturday In Atlanta, Texas

There will be an Easter egg hunt this Saturday at the Atlanta First United Methodist Church.  The Easter egg hunt will start at 10 a.m., with the younger kids going first, then the older kids will then hunt for their eggs. There will be more than 2,000 eggs and prize eggs as well. The Easter egg hunt is open to all in the community and will be a great time for all of the children to gather for a great time of fun and fellowship. Here are the directions to the church.

Here is a little history of Easter egg hunts from Wikipedia.com:

The egg was a symbol of the rebirth of the earth in pre-Christian celebrations of spring. However, the Easter egg itself was defined by early Christians as an Easter symbol of the resurrection of Jesus: the egg symbol was likened to the tomb from which Christ arose.

Lizette Larson-Miller, a professor with the Graduate Theological Union of Berkeley, traces the specific custom of the Easter egg hunt to the Protestant Christian Reformer Martin Luther, stating "We know that Martin Luther had Easter egg hunts where the men hid the eggs for the women and children went and it probably has this connection back to this idea of eggs being the tomb." The Reverend MaryJane Pierce Norton, the Associate General Secretary of Leadership Ministries at the General Board of Discipleship, states that "there’s something about going to hunt the eggs just as we might go to hunt for Jesus in the tomb. And when we find them it’s that joy that the women had when they reached the tomb first and found that Jesus was no longer there." Traditionally the game is associated with Easter and Easter eggs (Easter egg hunt), but it has also been popular with spring time birthday parties.

At least since the 17th century the idea of the Easter Bunny to bring the Easter eggs has been known.

The novelty of the introduction of Easter egg hunts into England is evidenced by A. E. Housman's inaugural lecture as Professor of Latin at University College, London in 1892, in which he said, "In Germany at Easter time they hide coloured eggs about the house and garden that the children may amuse themselves in discovering them."

Egg hunts are a subject of the Guinness Book of World Records. For example, Homer, Georgia, United States was listed in 1985 with 80,000 eggs to hunt in a town of 950 people.