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The Holiday Season brings people together through shared traditions. We watch children’s faces light up with joy and wonder as they wait in line to share their wish lists with Santa Claus. We gather with our neighbors along city sidewalks for festive parades and in town squares for Christmas tree lightings. We attend services, plays, pageants, concerts, choir performances, and countless other holiday-themed events, too, all to keep the spirit of the season alive in our hearts and in our communities from year to year. ...read more
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The Appalachian Mountains are among the oldest mountain ranges on Earth. They have withstood the changes of millennia, and over the final weekend of September 2024, the Appalachians sustained a monumental event that forever altered their landscapes, their communities, and the lives of the people who call them home. ...read more
Inspiration | Local Flavor | Mast in the News
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You could say that 2024 has been a year filled with contradictions. The awesome power and determination of water to foment destruction from the gulf shores to the Appalachian Mountains played out around us. The wrath of the storm was followed by rivers of people and supplies, truckloads of hay and rocks, warm hugs and encouraging words. ...read more
Adventure | Inspiration | Local Flavor | Travel
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... Our favorite foods! Food is universal because everybody’s got ta eat! And the last two months of the year are filled with more than their fair share of family meals, work gatherings, special outings to favorite restaurants, tins filled with homemade cookies and fudge, and the anticipation of food traditions handed down from generation to generation ...read more
At Home | Recipes
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Even before we bought the Mast General Store, we were taken by the beauty of Valle Crucis. We’ve heard people describe the drive out Broadstone Road as traveling through a time portal. In the 1970s, fields in the river bottoms would be filled with tobacco, cabbage, or high with hay to feed cattle that were grazing in the summer pasture. ...read more
Local Flavor | Mast Family Favorites
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The lucky few who have seen the Earth from a different perspective – astronauts - all echo the same viewpoint upon their return. Yuri Gagarin, a Russian cosmonaut and the first human to go to space, commented, “Orbiting Earth in the spaceship, I saw how beautiful our planet is. People, let us preserve and increase this beauty, not destroy it.”
Behind the Scenes | Inspiration
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You could say that 2024 has been a year filled with contradictions. The awesome power and determination of water to foment destruction from the gulf shores to the Appalachian Mountains played out around us. The wrath of the storm was followed by rivers of people and supplies, truckloads of hay and rocks, warm hugs and encouraging words.
In Gloria Houston’s children’s classic The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree, an Appalachian family must provide the community’s Christmas tree as is the custom. Set in 1918, Ruthie and her father pick out the perfect balsam on the slopes of Grandfather Mountain. In the meantime, he is called to serve in World War I, which causes great hardship for her family, and Ruthie is chosen to play the Christmas angel. It’s a story of tradition, sacrifice, resilience, and hope. And it's a story that sounds familiar. Yes, indeed, this is a year for the perfect Christmas tree.
The tradition of bringing evergreen branches and boughs inside spans to ancient peoples. Pines and firs reminded people that the sun would once again return, crops would be growing in the fields, and fruits bountiful on trees.
It is believed that Martin Luther, a Catholic priest whose actions led to the Protestant Reformation, began the practice of a lighted Christmas tree. He was fascinated by the stars twinkling through the boughs of evergreen trees in the forest. Luther recreated the scene in the main room of his house by putting up a tree and wiring candles to its branches.
The Christmas Tree came to America in mid-1800s. When Queen Victoria was sketched beside a decorated tree, not only did the people of the United Kingdom embrace the tradition but the elites of the East Coast of the United States began to favor having a tree at Christmastime. There were some differences though. In Europe, the tree was tabletop height, while people in the United States preferred a floor-to-ceiling tree.
Christmas trees as we know them today are a recent phenomenon. While the first Christmas tree marketplace was held in 1851 in New York City, trees were not cultivated as a crop until the turn of the 20th century. Before the first patch of planted trees were harvested in 1908 by W. V. McGalliard in Mercer County, New Jersey, trees were cut from fence lines and forest edges from Canada and the northeastern United States. And, even when they were cultivated, they didn’t have the preferred conical shape but were less dense.
Andrew Abraczinskas, an immigrant from Lithuania living in Pennsylvania in 1910, developed a method of shearing his Scotch Pines that created denser growth and the shape of a true conical Christmas tree shape.
After World War II, Appalachian farmers began looking for produce that could replace formerly profitable crops like cabbage and beans. Some farmers started growing balsam fir, Douglas fir, and Scotch pine, but the “Cadillac of Christmas trees,” the Fraser fir was waiting for its day in the sun.
Fraser firs, named for John Fraser (a contemporary of Andre Michaux), thrive at elevations above 5,000 and are survivors of the last ice age. Their home climate on the slopes of Roan Mountain, Grandfather Mountain, and Mount Mitchell is like a temperate rainforest receiving more than 80 inches of rain each year. The likelihood that summer days will be shrouded in fog also contributes to one of the Fraser firs’ selling points – long needle retention, which is achieved by closing their stomates, small openings on the backsides of their needles, to reduce moisture loss. This ability is accomplished through their adaptation to a climate that is wet, cold, fog-enrobed, and windy.
Until the early 1960s, the Fraser fir had little value. Early logging in the Appalachian Mountains ignored these in deference to hardwoods and other pines. The southern balsam fir, as the Fraser fir was often called, was used in reforestation programs and has good success growing in poor soil.
The North Carolina Christmas Tree Association was formed by five Avery County growers in 1959. Then in 1971, a Fraser fir was chosen for the first time to be the official White House Christmas tree. That was only about 16 years after a concerted effort was made to grow and market these trees.
In 2024, a North Carolina Fraser fir will again be the guest of honor in the Blue Room at the White House. It is the sixteenth time a North Carolina tree has been selected through a contest sponsored by the National Christmas Tree Association and is the second year in a row that a Western North Carolina farm is supplying the tree. This year’s winner is Cartner’s Christmas Tree Farm in Newland.
The 25-year-old tree was selected in the field by Dale Haney, the grounds superintendent for the White House, and Blair Downey, White House chief usher, and is 20 feet tall and 12 feet wide.
According to an article in the Carolina Journal, Sam Cartner, whose family started in the Christmas tree business in 1959, said, “We’re really proud of our trees in North Carolina. It’s not just about Cartner’s. It’s about Fraser Firs raised in Western North Carolina.”
In the same article, Cartner commented on the number of people that called to make sure the farm was all right in the wake of the devastation caused by Helene. His farm lost about 5,000-6,000 trees under four-feet tall to mudslides; this number represents about 10% of their future harvest in 2028 or 2029.
The tree will be harvested on November 20 to begin the trek to Washington, D.C. The tree, nicknamed “Tree-mendous,” will be presented to First Lady Jill Biden on Monday, November 25.
Having a real, fresh-from-the-field Christmas tree has been a call from tree growers for years, but this year it is taking on a whole new importance. Purchasing a real tree from a choose-and-cut farm or even from a tree lot in your local area will help growers in Western North Carolina, East Tennessee, and Southwest Virginia recover from the effects of Helene. A “trip up the mountain” will be even more impactful when you stay at a local hotel or rental, eat at a local restaurant, and shop at local stores.
There are many other reasons to choose a real tree as your family’s holiday centerpiece:
Start a new tradition - the best way to know you have the freshest tree possible is to find it yourself. And the experience of "the hunt" makes many memories that are sure to be told and re-told for Christmases to come. Many choose and cut farms offer much more than just the opportunity to cut your tree; they have roping, wreaths, and some have hayrides, hot chocolate, and perhaps a visit with a jolly old elf from the North Pole. Plan to make your trip to the fields early and call ahead to verify hours of operation, availability of trees, etc. Many farms are sold out of their supply of trees by, or sometimes before, Thanksgiving.
These listings will make it easier to find a tree grower near you.
North Carolina Christmas Tree Growers Association Search for Trees
Watauga County Christmas Tree Growers Association Choose and Cut Farms
Avery County Choose & Cut Farms
Haywood County Choose & Cut Farms
South Carolina Christmas Tree Farms
Tennessee Cut-Your-Own Christmas Tree Farms
Virginia Christmas Tree Growers Association
When you get your tree home, store it in a cool garage or shady place until you're ready to decorate it.
Before carrying it into the house, unbind all the branches and let them settle into place. Pick it up just a bit and drop it on its trunk to help dislodge any dead needles.
Make a fresh straight cut across the trunk. This will help it be ready to "drink" from its water reservoir.
If possible, keep the room where the tree is a little cooler.
Placement is important. Keep the tree away from fireplaces, so it won't dry out as quickly.
Check the water in your tree daily. It will "drink" more than you think. Keep the reservoir in the tree stand filled with clean water.
Enjoy!
Prize-winning tree photo is courtesy of the North Carolina Christmas Tree Association. Pictured, left to right, Dale Haney (superintendent of grounds at the White House), David Cartner, Sam Cartner, Ronnie Beam (Cartner Farms manager), Jim Cartner, and Blair Downey (White House chief usher).