The tradition dates back to the 1930s.
On Christmas Eve of 1931, during the height of the Great Depression, workers at the Rockefeller Center decided to pool their money together to buy a tree that they then decorated with homemade garland from their families.
2 years later, the tradition was made official by the Rockefeller Center and that’s when the first lighting ceremony was held.
In 1936, they put up a second tree to celebrate the opening of the skating rink.
It gets recycled after being sawed down.
That’s right! The first time the tree was given a second life after being taken down was in 1971, when it was used to provide mulch for the nature trails across the city. The Boy Scouts of America even funded projects by selling mulch from the tree. The stump has been donated to the US Olympic Equestrian Team Headquarters in New Jersey as an obstacle jump for training horses. In more recent years, it has been used for several housing projects with Habitat for Humanity. For example, in 2007, it was used to build houses in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
It’s quite the green initiative.
No pun intended! In 2007, the incandescent bulbs were replaced with LED lights that are powered by solar panels on the rooftop of buildings in Rockefeller Center. Those are even visible on Google Maps.
The tree was once a gift from Canada.
It’s someone’s job to scout the tri-state area for the tree with the best <
It’s the only non-US tree that was ever used.
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