Page 17 - Discover Winter 2023
P. 17
Go anywhere in the United States in Given the divide between the early
mid-December, and the scene is very familiar: Americans and King George, it’s easy to
Christmas decorations are everywhere you understand why the custom was not readily
look, and people are generally making merry. adopted on this side of the Atlantic. However,
There’s a Christmas tree in nearly every window, there were a fair number of our early citizens
festooned with twinkling lights and ornaments who were of German ancestry, so the Christmas
of all description. Tables are laden with tree was here, but not widely popular. The
sumptuous Christmas feasts. bottom line is that we had no real widespread
cultural American Christmas traditions until
The streets and shopping malls are
much later. In fact, it wasn’t until 1870 that
teeming with gift shoppers and seasonal sales.
President Ulysses S. Grant made Christmas an
Children’s excitement escalates as the magic
official Federal holiday, in an attempt to unite
day approaches. It’s hard to imagine that this
north and south.
scenario hasn’t always existed in this country, but
the truth is that it hasn’t. The first documented
Christmas tree in the United
The colonial Puritans and
States was set up by a Harvard
the Calvinists in Massachusetts
professor in Cambridge,
and other parts of New England
Massachusetts in the mid-
took a dim view of making
1830s. Charles Follen was a
merry at Christmas time. They
political exile from Germany,
believed that it should be a time
and he brought that tradition
of fasting and strict rituals. This
here. In 1835, a British writer
was so dominant a view that in
named Harriet Martineau
17th century Massachusetts,
wrote of her visit to Follen’s
people were fined for celebrating
home, complete with details
the holiday. After it became a
about the tree, a spruce tree
state, Massachusetts schools and
decorated with candles and
businesses did not celebrate it at
presents for Follen’s little boy.
all.
The following year, Follen’s
This was not true in the entirety of the colleague, Herman Bokum, also a German
new nation. Many early colonists and citizens immigrant, wrote a book, “A Stranger’s
observed Christmas based on the traditions of Gift”, which featured the first known printed
their home countries; thus they were anything illustration of a Christmas tree in this country.
but uniform. The Christmas tree itself has its
Queen Victoria and Prince Albert’s
origins in sixteenth century Germany. Legend
Christmas tree gained nationwide attention here,
has it that Martin Luther himself “invented”
which fueled American newspaper reports about
the Christmas tree, but it’s only a legend. Prince
Christmas trees in the 1850s. Of all the various
Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, is often
traditions that were brought here, none was more
credited with the introduction of the festive fir
universally adopted than the Christmas tree.
tree to England in 1840, but the earliest known
example dates back to 1800, when Queen This is not to say that antebellum
Charlotte, the German wife of King George III Americans did not observe or celebrate
(remember him?) set up a tree at Queen’s Lodge. Christmas, only that we were not united with
www.discoversmithmountainlake.com
w w w . disc o v ersmithmountainlak e . c om 15
