A few years ago Dan Cunningham was in Grand Rapids, Mich., for the USA/Canada Lyons International forum. During a dinner one night he struck up a conversation with a woman about ways people can raise money for local charities. Cunningham told her about the village of miniature houses he sets up during the holidays and she immediately asked if she could send him one of her houses.

“I met a woman that had lost everything she had during Hurricane Katrina; her fishing boat, her home and her husband. All she had left were two of these little houses,” said Cunningham.

The house now adorns his mantle in a small and unremarkable way that seems to pale in comparison to many of his others. That is, until he explains where the house came from.

“It really meant a lot to me because of the circumstances,” said Cunningham.

His mini winter wonderland will be choo-chooing for charity at 270 Squantum Drive until Jan. 6. Cunningham opens his village to local residents to collect donations for the Providence Ronald McDonald House, Rhode Island Children with Cancer, Camp Surefire and A Wish Come True.

He has spent over 168 hours constructing this year’s miniature village fully equipped with working trains and singing choruses.

The 125 mini houses in Cunningham’s garage look like a scene straight out of ‘It’s A Wonderful Life.’

He has six Norman Rockwell Saturday Evening Post<$> houses, a Marine Corps band and his 1835 Bristol, England homes are one of only two sets in the country. As cherished as his collection is, the Katrina survivor remains the nearest and dearest to his heart.

Cunningham’s collection began in 1989 when his wife gave him five houses for Christmas. The rest, he says, is history. As his collection grew, it eventually became too big for his house, so he had to move it to the garage. Now it is so big he had to get a whole new house for it. Well ok, that may not be the real reason for the move, but he hopes his new neighborhood will be even more generous than the last.

Cunningham opened his village to the public six years ago while he was living in Cranston and raised $1,500 last year.

“I want to put a challenge to Warwick residents to beat what we collected in Cranston,” said Cunningham.

As he starts up the trains and gets the choirs singing, he jokes that he is a 12-year-old boy trapped in the body of a 67-year-old man. Man-boy or not, this freelance Santa is the epitome of what it means to be a good-hearted individual.

Cunningham served as the District Governor for the Rhode Island Lyons Club and is the current Warwick Lyons president. He also serves on the boards of the Providence Ronald McDonald House and Camp Surefire.

For anyone that donates $20 to charity, Cunningham will give them a cookbook made by families that stayed in the Providence Ronald McDonald House.

The miniature village is open to the public nightly from 6 to 9 p.m.