Two hundred deodars, covered with thousands of bright Yule lights, make up the magic of Christmas Tree Lane.
My tea is nearly ready and the sun has left the sky. It's time to take the window to see Leerie going by; For every night at teatime and before you take your seat, With lantern and with ladder, he comes posting up the street ... THIS WARMLY REMEMBERED verse of Robert Louis Stevenson glows in reality along the downtown streets of Altadena, California, during the Christmas season. Sixty old-fashioned lamp-posts line the business district of the suburban foothills community, and schoolboys costumed in top hats, gayly colored scarves, and topcoats serve as Lamplighters. The annual event is but one of the numerous spectacles which magically transform Altadena into a giant, living Christmas Card. Seeds of this ambitious civic spirit were literally sown 75 years ago when Col. Fred Woodbury planted 200 Himalayan deodars along the roadway climbing to his ranch. The exotic trees grew into giant landmarks, and some 30 years ago Altadenans began decorating the trees with thousands of multicolored Yule lights. Thus was established the annual tradition of Christmas Tree Lane, a week-long nighttime phenomenon of nature and man which over the years has drawn several million entranced tourists. Down Christmas Tree Lane, processions of cars coast slowly, with their lights out and motors cut. For the mile's silent, awe-inspiring duration of this unique Christmas pilgrimage, even old-timers find themselves in the spell of a holy forest. Yet, behind the scenes of the event there's plenty of hard work, perseverance, and unselfish contribution of time and money required. County firemen volunteer services in stringing the lights from precarious 100-foot ladders. Boy Scouts join sheriff's deputies in directing the heavy traffic. A nonprofit association composed of leading businessmen and clubwomen has tirelessly solicited funds and taken over the preplanning chores. F. B. Nightingale, a local electrician living high up on the foothills of Altadena, decided some years ago that visitors should have a beacon to guide them to Christmas Tree Lane. So he built an impressive, 20-foot illuminated star above his home. The star, too, became a landmark, visible on clear nights from the distant city of Los Angeles. Then, eight years ago a group of mothers were inspired to create still another Christmas fantasy—this one to appeal primarily to children. They called their project Story Book Lane and formed their own association to devise ideas and pool talent. Housewives, clerks, professional men, and older children borrowed a vacant lot on which to construct the cardboard and plywood Mother Goose characters, Hansel and Gretel settings, and other fairy-tale "productions" which would come alive under colored spotlights on fifty lawns and rooftops at nightfall. "Every year we wonder if anyone will be willing to do all the work and put up with the inconvenience of staging another Story Book Lane," says Mrs. Clarence McFarland, an Altadena post-office employe who helped found this particular institution. "Then the children start getting excited about Christmas, and asking us when we're going to get to work. It's their enthusiasm that keeps alive our Christmas spirit and makes it worthwhile!" And that's the spirit that hovers over the entire town. For the local Rotary Club in cooperation with the community newspaper, The Altadenan, now sponsors an annual home decoration contest that takes in the whole of Altadena. Hundreds of homes light up during the Yuletide with Santa Claus vignettes at the chimneys, elves dancing on the lawns, replicas of the Manger and the Wise Men traveling toward the Star of Bethlehem, gardens bedecked with jeweled lights and tinsel, king-size candy canes, and wreaths of eastern holly. . . . ALONG ABOUT the time the Lamplighters set the lantern wicks aglow against the "teatime sky," just off the main business district yet another outdoor event is readied every year by the Theatre Americana troupe, joined for the holiday occasion by service clubs and professional and amateur talent. This is Christmas in Our Town Square, a musical pageant which traditionally blends regional lore with the sacred spirit of Christmas. Professional Hollywood set designers, musicians, and actors often work side by side with PTA members, shopkeepers, ministers, and neighbors from all walks of life to produce the pageant. Churches of all denominations, meanwhile, as in small towns across the face of America, have their own Christmas season programs and pageantry. One of the most widely known is the block-long sidewalk tableau staged by St. Elizabeth's Church—a display of life-size scenes from the life of Christ, softly lighted and in a natural setting, which bears a resemblance to far-away Jerusalem. Altadenans don't seem to mind the work, though. Already they have started writing invitations to friends in all 50 states, asking them to drop around this coming Christmas time. There's one thing sure about Altadena's Christmas card. It won't fit into any ordinary envelope!
Suburbia Today, December 1960 17
Coral Gables Historical Archive