Please welcome guest author Ted Olson. Olson has lived at higher and at lower elevations in the Blue Ridge region, working as a college professor, a National Park Service ranger, and a naturalist. One of his earliest jobs involved selling Christmas trees.
Annual celebrations have long been central features of community life in the rural Blue Ridge. Whether specifically Appalachian in origin (such as Decoration Day or various harvest festivals), or nationally observed (such as the 4th of July or Thanksgiving) or internationally acknowledged (Easter, Halloween), celebrations in the Blue Ridge have reflected distinctive regional characteristics. This is certainly true with the region’s most popular holiday, Christmas.
Historically celebrated in the Blue Ridge with little of the crass commercialism found in contemporary America, Christmas in the region has reflected biblical mythologies in combination with popular culture and local customs. As practiced in the Blue Ridge, the holiday was associated with folk beliefs dating back centuries.
The ancient tradition known as “Old Christmas”—celebrating Christmas in early January—continued to be observed in the region until recent years. Into the twentieth century some Blue Ridge residents maintained a magical belief that at the stroke of midnight on December 24 (Christmas Eve), animals would talk.
Many young people on Christmas Eve and well into Christmas morning would roam through their rural communities “serenading” their neighbors. This traditional activity involved the singing of Christmas carols, and much more. Youths might approach houses in the dark and try to startle the occupants with loud noises (screaming, clanging cowbells, exploding firecrackers, or blasting guns); the occupants might subsequently open their doors and let the youths inside for singing and for the giving of various treats, such as oranges.
Although Christmas was an occasion for good will, those serenading might play pranks on their neighbors, an example being the rearranging or hiding of possessions such as tools. At other times, young people might try to sneak up to a house and shout “Christmas gift!” without being noticed, and if they were successful, the occupants would be obligated to give them a gift; however, if the occupants spied the interlopers and called them out before they could shout, then the young people would have to provide a gift.
Limited access to manufactured decorations and gifts compelled many people to improvise when preparing for the holiday. Over the years, seasonal house decorations have included bouquets of dried grass and wildflowers, pinecones, berries, clusters of Galax leaves and Christmas fern fronds, and bowls of apples; items from outside the region—mistletoe, oranges, and red- and green-colored ropes—were also popular for holiday decorating.
Lit candles were often placed by windows to illuminate the early darkness associated with the winter season. In the old days, gifts at Christmastime tended to be modest—perhaps a handmade toy or a store-bought pocketknife for youths, and, for adults, an article of clothing, a tool, or a book. Owing to the scarcity of retail stores in some areas, it was not uncommon for people to give “second-hand” gifts. Particularly appreciated, though, would be a homemade “fruitcake” (an apple stack-cake).
Blue Ridge residents when selecting their Christmas tree—a Germanic tradition that arrived later in the Blue Ridge than in other parts of the eastern U.S.—would harvest whatever species was prolific in their locality.
People living in higher elevations would cut and employ as their Christmas tree a Fraser fir or red spruce (today, these two types of trees are grown and sold seasonally in the high mountains along the border between North Carolina and Tennessee), while people dwelling in lower elevations might use a red cedar, American holly, or eastern hemlock. Regardless of the species, Christmas trees were decorated primarily with natural materials—sycamore balls, strings of popcorn, and shredded cotton—and were augmented by such store-bought products as crepe paper and cellophane.
Christmas Tree I’m winded yet warm right now, having climbed to bring them a tree; though the thin air hurts, I came here because my body still works— I thought I’d use it to help old neighbors endure this Christmas. *** This winter’s vista little resembles the one they valued when they saw green: their mountain’s standing out from its shadow like a gravestone, marking their absence from future landscapes. *** With my shovel I scoop a scrawny fir, barely a sapling— its trunk narrow, its roots shallow: my cold hands cradle what’s left of the earth that nourished giants before I was born.
–This essay is adapted from Ted Olson, Blue Ridge Folklife (University Press of Mississippi, 1998). This poem is from Ted Olson, Breathing in Darkness (Wind Publications, 2006).
More articles from Ted Olson:
Rediscovering the Roots of Bluegrass: Historically Significant Recordings from the Great Smoky Mountains Released(Opens in a new browser tab)
‘Can You Sing Or Play Old-Time Music?’ — The Johnson City Sessions(Opens in a new browser tab)
The Definitive ‘Appalachian Novel’ Celebrates Its Diamond Anniversary(Opens in a new browser tab)
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