Christmas Tidings
History Christmas Tree Article
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Christmas Tree Lights
from: Karlie BestlerEveryone likes to see a decorated and brightly lit tree. As Christmas happens in the middle of winter, people like the brightness of Christmas tree lights. What we know as Christmas tree lights are strands of small electric lights that we wind around the branches of the tree. Before the invention of electricity people used Christmas tree candle holders to place candles to light up their Christmas trees.
The first set of electric Christmas tree lights were invented in New York in 1882. By 1900 businesses across America had Christmas tree lights twinkling in their windows, but they were too expensive for most people. It was 1930 before electric Christmas tree lights really started to take over from candles. The electric Christmas tree lights had bulbs the size of walnuts, but these became smaller over time until we got the tiny ones that we have today.
Looking at history Christmas tree lights were first used outside in San Diego in 1904. Some cities argue about this, claiming that they were the first to decorate outdoor evergreen trees with Christmas tree lights. A town called McAdenville in North Carolina actually made the claim as late as 1956. Certainly ordinary households did not adopt the practice of putting lights outside until the mid 1950s.
After a time Christmas tree lights were not restricted to Christmas trees. Christmas tree shops had them adorning the edges of their windows, and people soon began to adopt this idea. You will also find lights around mirrors in people's houses and sometimes adorning mantelpieces. Some cities have illumination ceremonies and strings of lights will be hung vertically from skyscraper buildings.
Nowadays there are different types of Christmas tree lights. There are incandescent bulbs and battery powered lights. You can now buy artificial fiber optic Christmas trees that sparkle in many colors and fiber optics Christmas trees already decorated.
Christmas tree lights come in sets of different sizes, depending on the type of bulb used. Larger ones come in sets of 25 and sets of incandescent Christmas tree mini lights can be anything between 50 and 100 lights on the string. The battery powered lights come in much smaller sets, usually 10 to 12 in a set.
In the beginning the Christmas tree light bulbs were often shaped and painted like glass ornaments. Nowadays this type of light can only be obtained from specialist stores or over the internet. Later designs, particularly the Christmas tree mini set lights, sometimes came with attached plastic or glass ornaments. Christmas tree mini set lights may also have ornaments and sometimes more than one light is attached to an ornament.
In the United States it is quite common to see Christmas tree lights used on holidays other than Christmas, especially for Halloween. Strings of clear white Christmas tree lights are also used for lighting up patios. Sometimes, seeing the lights at all different times tends to take away some of the magic of Christmas that the lights used to represent.
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