REQ Crossroads: Our First Christmas Tree!

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Nowadays, it’s extremely common to put a Christmas tree up in your house.

It’s a festive symbol of the season and a wonderful opportunity to exclaim “They cost HOW much now??” But it wasn’t always this way!

Back in the 1850s, which is when this story takes place, or perhaps when it was filmed, nobody in America had ever heard of Christmas trees. Santa delivered presents underneath a burlap sack of turnips, you hung ornaments on the dog, and that song “O Christmas Tree” was just called “O”. Then a guy named Reverend Schwan cut down a tree, put it inside his church, and people lost their damn minds.

Townsfolk thought the tree was an evil symbol of pagan witchcraft. Which, come on, evil symbols of pagan witchcraft look way cooler! But look at how it was corrupting the children! One moment they’re holding hands and softly singing Christmas carols around a tree, the next moment they might be doing something even more unspeakable like volunteering!

Find out how Reverend Schwan silenced the haters and in the process got his arms all sticky with sap and scratched up from pine needles in Crossroads: Our First Christmas Tree!

Written by: Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, Conor Lastowka, Jason Miller, and Zach Shatzer