Quoted: â??When Queen Victoria and her German husband, Prince Albert, decorated a Christmas tree in Windsor Palace in 1848, it was widely reported in popular American publications,â? says Jim Leary, professor and director of the Folklore Program at UW-Madison. â??Well-to-do, fashion-minded Americans soon followed suit, with rural and working-class folks not that far behind. By 1856, President Franklin Pierce gave the Christmas tree official sanction when he had one decorated in the White House.â?
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