O Christmas Tree, when did you become a tradition?
Barbara Banaian
As I waited in the car last weekend, I watched Christmas trees being unloaded onto a lot, and I was captivated by such a pleasant sight. The trees were green and fresh, and looked pretty and healthy. And I also realized how little I know about Christmas trees.
And I might add that the trees in this area are so much prettier than those in the desert (California), where we once bought a tree that lost all its needles the very next day.
Many people go directly to tree farms to get their trees. I wondered where these trees came from. Chances are they came from a tree wholesaler, but did they travel far? Chances are, because shipping trees is expensive — maybe on a refrigerated truck — only the nicer, more expensive trees came from out of state.
But why do we bring trees indoors at this time of year, and decorate them?
There are so many things that I — and perhaps others — take for granted without a grasp of their history. Knowing the history makes everything more meaningful. History deserves to be remembered.
Sources suggest that the custom of Christmas trees began around the time of the Middle Ages in Europe.
What I remember growing up is a story of Martin Luther, enchanted by a frost-covered tree on a midnight walk through the forest. The icicles reflected the twinkling stars, and Luther was inspired to bring it home for his winter-weary family.
It is said that Luther felt the pines represented the goodness of God. But Luther may have been using an existing tradition to make a different story. The first to actually decorate the tree were probably German bakers using apples, tinsel and baked treats.
Meanwhile, the Paradise Play (which tells the story of Adam and Eve) was performed in the 12th century. An evergreen tree was decorated with apples for this day to illustrate Eve's fateful choice. As the Middle Ages gave way to the Renaissance, this tradition began to go out of style.
But the Baker's Guild, in 1492, was said to have a Paradise tree festooned with gingerbread, tinsel, waffles. The tradition flourished, first in France and Germany. By the 1840s, the Christmas tree was brought to the U.S. through German immigrants.
Around that time as well an organist in Leipzig, Germany, took a song called “Ach Tannenbaum” and added lyrics to commemorate the tree's winter tradition. We mostly know the first verse of that song, O Tannenbaum (“Oh Fir Tree”) but the organist gave us the full story with his added second verse “
With what delight I see you!/When winter days are dark and drear/You bring us hope for all the year.”
By 1850, there was Christmas tree trading. Some, including President Theodore Roosevelt, did not like them and felt they were a waste of precious trees. Yet today there are 15,000 Christmas tree farms supporting $2 billion of commerce annually (selling between 25 to 33 million trees.)
Over the years we went from apples to tinsel, from candles to electric lights and from baked treats to ornaments we save from year to year.
As I write this the ground is still bare, but soon there will be the white of winter that can be offset by the green of a tree in your home. Best wishes for a wonderful holiday season — and keep the cheer for soon the new year will be here!