This tree is located near the entrance to the famous Hotel Del Coronado.... a few steps toward Orange Avenue.
This website (
visit link) elaborates:
"In 1904, the Hotel del Coronado – already considered a technological marvel – made history when it unveiled the world’s first electrically-lighted, outdoor, living Christmas tree. To accomplish this feat, electric lights (probably made on site) were strung from the hotel (at that time one of the largest buildings in America to have electricity) to a nearby Norfolk Island Pine.
Although indoor Christmas trees had become popularized in America by this time, electric Christmas lights were all but unheard of (candles were still commonplace), and no one had thought to light an outdoor tree.
Other areas didn’t follow suit until later, when the trend seemed to travel from the West Coast to the East Coast as a civic effort: Pasadena in 1909; New York and Boston in 1912; and Philadelphia in 1913.
The Del’s original 1904 Christmas tree, which was planted in 1888 (the year the hotel was built) was modest in size - a reported 50 feet tall. Today it is a stately 140 feet. Still, the idea of an outside Christmas tree – with lights! – captivated all who saw it.
In a San Diego Union article published on Christmas day that year, the writer was poetic in her appreciation:
A Christmas tree in the open air! A Christmas tree in which birds found shelter for the night; a Christmas tree through which the sea breeze swept. A living, growing tree with its roots embracing Mother Earth and its great branches reaching toward the stars.
The specific process of outfitting the tree (whose branches “stand proudly forth”) with lights was detailed:
All day yesterday electricians were busy fitting it up and by night 250 lights of many colors gave beauty to the fine old pine. Lanterns, great and small, hung from its boughs.
The reporter continued to pay tribute to this wondrous sight:
All evening long, the radiant tree was the object of admiration. All evening long, two barefooted children, a boy and a girl, stood… and gazed upon the beaming tree. The little girl held her brother’s hand close within her own. They spoke scarcely a word. The imprint of their little feet is even yet visible in the rain-softened earth.
When the rain began to come down faster and faster, the children, casting a last long look upon the beauty of the night, sped away home to tell of the wonderful Christmas tree. Little wonder that all the children marveled, for their elders did the same, and now that the open-air Christmas tree has been introduced, it is likely that another Christmas eve will find many California gardens aglow with light scattered from living foliage.
According to the newspaper, the tree was lighted every night from 7 – 10 p.m., starting on Christmas Eve and continuing through December 31st. This, in itself, was impressive given the fact that indoor Christmas trees were usually only illuminated two or three times during the entire holiday season and only for very short periods of time (candle flames had to be watched closely, with buckets of sand and water always nearby). Apparently, the public’s fascination with The Del’s Christmas tree was responsible for the tree’s extended performance. From the December 28, 1904 San Diego Union:
So much interest [was aroused] in the outdoor Christmas tree with its many electric decorations as to have it illuminated each evening for the rest of the year.
As a footnote, the newspaper added that “several professional photographers were over last night."
The article continues with a further history of Christmas trees throughout the years.