The past comes alive at Christmas.  From Evergleams on Eighth in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, to an Aluminum Forest in Hilton Head, South Carolina, to Home for the Holidays at the Electric House at the Johnson County Museum in Overland Park, Kansas, the short-lived reign of the aluminum Christmas tree resurfaces each year across the country.  Long associated with “commercialism” in Charles Schulz’s annual Christmas classic A Charlie Brown Christmas (Lucy suggested for the kids’ nativity play a “big, shiny aluminum tree… maybe painted pink”), now the trees are an intriguing artifact of the post-World War II atomic era and the Midcentury Modern art movement–one of our favorite subjects here at borg, discussed in the context of Disneyana here, futurism here, advertising here, Hollywood props and costumes here, Christmases past here, and the furniture and set pieces used in Star Trek here.

If you can’t visit one of these Atomic Forests in person, we’re taking you on your own virtual journey today, where the key to the display is context.

This year the Johnson County Museum in Overland Park, Kansas, invited the public to step back into the sparkle of the 1950s with a special holiday exhibit celebrating the 65th anniversary of the iconic aluminum Christmas tree.  Now through January 4, 2024, visitors can experience the glitz and glamour of Midcentury holiday décor as the museum’s All-Electric House transforms into a wonderland of vintage aluminum trees.

What’s the Electric House?  A vintage experimental home from the era now housed inside the museum, showcasing architecture, design, technology, culture, and the ambience of the era.  So when you fill the house with aluminum Christmas trees, and put them in their historical context, it adds an element that will take many back to their youths, where the visions of the future were infused into every part of life.  Others get to see a unique window into the past for the first time.

The exhibit showcases more than twenty aluminum Christmas trees from a private collection (we discussed some of these here at borg last Christmas).  Carefully curated, these vintage pieces hail from the late 1950s into the early-mid 1960s, and highlight the unique variety of colors, sizes, and styles that made aluminum trees a sensation.

From the striking use of color to the new shapes and imagery, post-World War U.S.A. represented its new technologies, materials, and conveniences, and its excitement for space exploration in everyday objects, art, and advertising.  And for two decades that included aluminum Christmas trees that were as convenient to buy for a few dollars as your closest Sears & Roebuck catalog or Walgreens store.

Why aluminum?  It was abundant after the war effort, no longer needed for the tools of war.  Vintage aluminum Christmas trees teach us about an interesting time in history.  Who would think today that Americans in the 1950s didn’t want a red Christmas tree?  Why?  It was the Atomic Age, and fear of Communism can be seen in the fact that the rarest of those vintage trees from the era were red.  But that didn’t keep families from buying spectacular star-shaped ornaments called Sputniks for their decorating.

Only it’s believed to be A Charlie Brown Christmas’s side-eye to the trees as the emblem of commercialism that brought them to an end.

Seen in the context of a period home, possibly for the first time on a scale like this, you really get a feel for sitting around with friends and family listening to the Rat Pack singing familiar Christmas tunes with all that smoke-filled, cocktail lounge vibe.

Some of the trees are displayed with vintage skirts, and others with revolving light wheels, all in the context of the era.  But note that instructions included with the trees warned not to use them with electric lights.  These trees are actual aluminum–not tinsel–and cords could get cut more easily.

Gold, green, silver, pink, and blue trees of different color combinations and material construction adorn the Electric Home inside and out–where you might have displayed a tree like this in a warmer climate like Florida or California.

Learn more about the aluminum Christmas tree exhibit, Home for the Holidays at the Electric House, displayed through January 4, 2024, at the Johnson County Museum website.

Merry Christmas from the staff at borg!

C.J. Bunce / Editor / borg