Christmas Tree 101 | Types, Tips & Trivia

DID YOU KNOW?

A New England–centric compendium of tree trivia.

• The first indoor Christmas tree in America is thought to have been put up in 1777 in Windsor Locks, CT, by a German POW captured at the Battle of Bennington.
• Harvard professor Charles Follen of Lexington, MA, is credited with popularizing the spread of decorated Christmas trees in the U.S. after a description of his tree in 1832 was published by a visiting journalist.
• Another Harvard professor, Hermann Bokum, further boosted the Christmas tree’s profile with his 1836 holiday book, A Stranger’s Gift, which included the first Christmas tree image published in the U.S.
• New Hampshire’s Franklin Pierce reputedly was the U.S. president responsible for introducing the Christmas tree to the White House, back in 1853.
• In 1923, Calvin Coolidge held the first National Christmas Tree lighting ceremony on the White House lawn. Back then, the tree was a 48-foot cut balsam from Coolidge’s home state, Vermont; today it’s a living blue spruce from Pennsylvania.
• Over the past 50-odd years, only three trees from New England have served as the official White House Christmas tree: one from Massachusetts, one from Vermont, and one “anonymously donated from New England.”
• The tallest tree ever to grace New York’s Rockefeller Center during the holidays was a 100-foot spruce cut in Killingworth, CT, in 1999.
• In terms of towering trees, you can’t beat the evergreens that perch atop the masts of some of New England’s most iconic tall ships each December, including the Charles W. Morgan in Mystic, CT, and the Friendship in Salem, MA.
• In 2012, New England Christmas tree farms reaped more than $17 million in sales, according to the most recent USDA census. The state with the most farms: Connecticut (490). The state with the fewest: Rhode Island (48).
• To see the shapeliest, most Christmas-y trees in New England, head to the Big E fair in Massachusetts, where growers from all six states compete. As of press time, the reigning grand champion (2015, 2016) was FinestKind Tree Farm of Maine.

LEADERS IN THE FIELD

A look at some popular tannenbaum types.

FRASER FIR (Abies fraseri)