The Holidays Are All Aglow
December 21, 2009
Just in passing, today is the shortest day of the calendar year. The sun rises later and sets sooner leaving many hours of darkness. However, we are in the season of holiday lighting. Any drive around your community after dark will be brightened by light displays both modest and elaborate. The invention of the miniature lights has made lighting displays easier to install. Then there are the lighted sculptures of deer and trees and animals and whatever else a manufacturer can create. Added to these light displays are the enormous inflated snowmen, Santas, toys, nutcrackers, etc.
I can remember when my parents would take a tour with my sister and I to see all the light displays. This was back in the 1950s so we know that the tradition of outdoor lighting displays has been with us for a long time. According to historical records, the first electric holiday lights were displayed in the home of Edward Johnson, a colleague of Thomas Edison, just three years after the lights were invented. However, electrically lit trees were not common until after World War II.
Outdoor holiday lights were really not introduced to the public until 1927-1928, about 45 years after the first electric tree lights were demonstrated. General Electric was the first company to offer prewired Christmas light strings, but since they were unpatented, the manufacture of these prewired strings of bright lights proliferated.
I recommend that you set aside an evening and take a tour. The creativeness of the lighting is worth the trip.
Just in passing, today is the shortest day of the calendar year. The sun rises later and sets sooner leaving many hours of darkness. However, we are in the season of holiday lighting. Any drive around your community after dark will be brightened by light displays both modest and elaborate. The invention of the miniature lights has made lighting displays easier to install. Then there are the lighted sculptures of deer and trees and animals and whatever else a manufacturer can create. Added to these light displays are the enormous inflated snowmen, Santas, toys, nutcrackers, etc.
I can remember when my parents would take a tour with my sister and I to see all the light displays. This was back in the 1950s so we know that the tradition of outdoor lighting displays has been with us for a long time. According to historical records, the first electric holiday lights were displayed in the home of Edward Johnson, a colleague of Thomas Edison, just three years after the lights were invented. However, electrically lit trees were not common until after World War II.
Outdoor holiday lights were really not introduced to the public until 1927-1928, about 45 years after the first electric tree lights were demonstrated. General Electric was the first company to offer prewired Christmas light strings, but since they were unpatented, the manufacture of these prewired strings of bright lights proliferated.
I recommend that you set aside an evening and take a tour. The creativeness of the lighting is worth the trip.
posted by shirley harry at 8:20 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home