After a change in his career took him to the Harrisburg area for work, Rupp, who had been ghost hunting in Gettysburg many times, decided to settle down there. Before later relocating to the Shippensburg area.

“The story came about when my family came down. I just walked around with a little recorder, and then I wrote the book,” said the retired Rupp.

“Honestly, it’s just a hobby, and honestly, I myself hate to read, so the feedback I get is, “we can read this in about two hours two hours, and a lot of people like that,” he said.

Though not a trained writer, Rupp is able to develop his ideas based on his surroundings, as well as seemingly unrelated input from others.

“I just let it go where it goes. I’ll get an idea from something I see, anywhere. I was writing a book about five years ago, and my son sent me a song with a video, and that literally changed a whole scene from the book,” he said.

Since publishing his first novel, Love From Beyond, in 2015, Rupp has published a total of 11 books, but it would be a conversation with actor, director and producer Bo Brinkman that led to his break into the film industry.

Brinkman previously starred as Major Walter H. Taylor, aide-de-camp for General Robert E. Lee, in the 1993 film Gettysburg and its prequel Gods and Generals, released ten years later.

“We were having lunch one day talking about what would be a good movie, and I actually wanted another one of my stories, but he thought ‘A Gettysburg Christmas’ sounded perfect,” Rupp said.

“Ryan Kelly, a self proclaimed ‘hater of the holidays and love’ finds himself in the middle of a nightmare when his dysfunctional family comes to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Joining in on the festivities is Hope Corbin, a friend of his sister Denise. Will Ryan find love and the joy of the holiday season? Only the magic of Christmas and a mysterious angel will answer these questions,” the book’s official description on Amazon reads.

The film stars legendary actors, Lee Majors, Bruce Boxleitner, along with Kate Vernon, Sean Faris, Jake Busey, Tom Vera, Sarah Burkett and Kelley Jakle, of Pitch Perfect fame.

Though some minor tweaks were made throughout the story, including a gender swap of the main character, Rupp said he was very happy with the outcome.

“When I was writing it, in one scene, they were at a big store, but they filmed it in a little store here in town, which made it that much nicer, because when people come here, they can shop in the same store,” he said.

“I write all my books so people can come here and go to the places. That was my big thing about living in Gettysburg. I wanted to include real businesses and stuff so people reading the book could come here and walk in the character’s footsteps,” Rupp said, adding that although he’s not a history buff, he enjoys adding historical information throughout his writing.

“They did an excellent job with the movie. The film crew, the director, the actors were just so down to earth,” Rupp said.

“I grew up watching Lee Majors and The Six Million Man, and they say ‘don’t meet your heroes, but he couldn’t have been nicer,'” Rupp said, calling the experience, “surreal.”

“The first time they drove me down where they were filming a Christmas tree scene, and the first time I saw Lee Majors come out of the Christmas tree shack, I’m like, wow, he’s right in front of me, and he’s saying these lines,” he said.

For Rupp, the experience was literally life-changing, as he met his now-wife, Mary, while at an on-set Christmas tree farm, which he calls, “a Christmas miracle.” The couple would later marry at that exact spot.

“I remember watching some of the scenes they were filming, and then remembering sitting in my office at five o’clock in the morning, writing some of the scenes, and then here I am, what three, four years later, watching it play out,” he said.

“Hearing the actors say some of the words that I wrote, it was just like, ‘wow, I’m actually watching this coming to life,'” he said.

Rupp even made an appearance in the film, as his SUV can be seen driving around during one of the snowstorm scenes.

“The last day of Lee Major’s filming, I thanked him for being in the movie, and he said something to me that was so personal, and I’m going to keep that to myself, but I told my wife. It just blew me away how kind he was,” Rupp said.

Another highlight for Rupp was taking his mom to the set.

“She loves Christmas more than anybody I know. She was so happy. She loves Bruce Boxleitner, and she got to talk to him, and watching that bring joy to her was worth it,” he said.

Rupp and his wife also treated some of the cast and crew to some early morning ghost hunting.

Rupp hopes that having this movie under his belt might lead to further movie adaptations, with one title immediately springing to mind.

“She Didn’t Know” is a novel he finished earlier this year that chronicles the impact that families go through when a loved one takes their own life through the eyes of the girl who has passed on.

As with his other writings, Rupp incorporated real places such as Williamsport, Montoursville and his hometown of Trout Run into the storytelling.

“I wrote it to help people, I’m pretty proud of that one, and I’ve gotten some good feedback on it,” he said.

Not chasing fame and fortune, Rupp stressed that his writing is not done for himself.

“I hope my novels make somebody’s day. The movie, I hope it makes somebody happy that loves Christmas, and I did it for the town and the businesses there,” he said.