Oh tannebaum! Oh tannenbaum! I bet you thought that meant “Oh Christmas Tree” in German right? Actually the real word is “Weihnachtasbaum” but it’s not as sexy to sing.

Every year we stick a tree inside our house and put lights and things on it. Are we mad? And who’s idea was that?

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Well hang on to your baubles because in this Virtually Rick we examine the history of the Christmas Tree! 

Those lovely green things have been sold commercially in the U.S. since the 1850's. 

They’re grown in all 50 states -- Alaska and EVEN Hawaii! Alo-ho-ho-ha!

And more than one million acres of land are planted with ‘em, with around 36 million trees produced every year! Best sellers are the Douglas Fir, Balsam, Fraser, the White Pine & Scotch. 

The first recorded tree on display was in the 1830’s in Pennsylvania, but they’d been in German homes way earlier. In fact a lot earlier. You see it’s all to do with the Winter Solstice -- the longest night of the year which falls around December 21.

Way back then lots of peeps thought the sun was a god-thing and it was dying because they were seeing less of it so they used the boughs of evergreens to remind them that plants would grow green again when the Sun God got their act together and came back from the hospital.

The Ancient Egyptians shoved loads of green palm rushes in their homes as a sort of “up yours” to death. The Romans did the same in honor of Saturn (poor old Uranus was always kept in the dark!). The Druids and Celts and Vikings also used evergreens for a bit of sucking-up to God too!

But it was really the Germans in around the 16th century who brought lovely decorated trees into their Zuhause. Then the legend is that Protestant reformer Martin Luther thought they'd look cute with lighted candles on 'em. That doesn’t sound dangerous does it!? 

Christmas Trees took a while to catch on here in the U.S. as people were severely punished by the puritans if they did anything but go to church -- they even fined people for hanging decorations! Steady on! Bit of a buzz kill!