It’s been almost 33 years since sweet Barbara Holland went missing. It’s finally time for her friends and loved ones to pay tribute to her.

Barb was the lovable best friend of Nancy Wheeler on the new Netflix original series Stranger Things. She went missing during the second episode of the fictional show when a monster sucked her into a pool and killed her off-screen.

Malden resident Christian Chrysogiannis decided it was time to honor Barb with candlelight vigil at a local pool.

“I literally was at the bar with some of my friends and we were talking about … what happened to Barb,” Chrysogiannis said in an interview with Boston.com. “I made the joke, ‘What if we had a candlelight vigil for her?’”


That idea came to fruition in the form of a Facebook event, which had almost 3,000 people listed as “interested” or “going” by Monday evening.

“Please join family and friends as we come together to mourn, remember, and celebrate the life of our dear friend Barbara ‘Barb’ Holland,” Chrysogiannis, 26, wrote in the description for the event. “As many of you know Barb was last seen at Steve Harrington’s pool on November 8th 1983. She was always a voice of reason in a world of clout and uncertainty and we miss her dearly.”

Chrysogiannis said he fully intends on holding the event. It is slated to take place on September 17 at the Lt. Dennis Holland Memorial Swimming Pool.

Chrysogiannis made the event on Thursday, he said. Several friends had RSVPed by Friday, and responses started flooding in Saturday and Sunday.

The event host fully intends on holding a vigil to Stranger Things character Barb Holland. —

Chrysogiannis said he made the event because he wanted to capitalize on the cult following Stranger Things has gotten this summer. The character is just obscure enough that a vigil would be funny to the public, he said.

“I really started to think about it: ‘I wonder if I could get something to go viral,’” he said. “It had all the right ingredients … all the stars are aligning for this.”


Chrysogiannis aims to make the vigil as realistic as possible. He even considered going to a funeral home to take pictures of sample flower arrangements, in order to ask the attendees which one they preferred.

Vigil-goers who RSVPed on Facebook are fully invested in honoring Barb’s life properly.

“We miss you Barb. We don’t know why you left us and have so many questions, but more than anything we miss you at school. I don’t know how I’m going to pass algebra without that beautiful red head of hair to tutor me,” one person wrote.

Another post read: “Barb was always the one who would bring me my homework if I couldn’t make it to school. I miss her a lot.”

Rest in peace, Barb.