You could spend a good part of the year looking at all the Christmas ornaments on our Christmas trees. I have no idea how many we have, but there’s a lot. I think Claire’s philosophy is that you can never have too many ornaments or lights on a Christmas Tree.
Some of our ornaments are very old and have been handed down through the family. A number have been made by our kids over the years, starting when they were very young, some are from the various places we’ve lived and visited around the world. But the fascinating thing is that Claire can tell you where just about every one of them came from and almost all of them have a “story” associated with them.
The other day I noticed a bird in a nest on one of the trees… Claire said that it’s good luck to have a bird in a nest on a Christmas tree — who knew? Anyhow, it’s kind of interesting to hear about the where, when and why of each ornament.
One ornament on our tree is a pickle — even Claire hasn’t been able to adequately explain why a pickle should even be associated with Christmas, much less, become a Christmas tree ornament.
So…. I figured this must be a topic deserving of my extensive research.
My extensive research determined that no one is quite sure why the tradition of putting a pickle on a Christmas tree even exists at all. Several “sources” say it’s an old German tradition, but there seems to be a lot of evidence that disputes that theory. The most popular opinion is that the Christmas Pickle is a very old German tradition and that the pickle was the last ornament hung on the Christmas tree and then the first child to find the pickle got an extra present.
All the theories seem to have some reference to Germany, even one that describes a fighter in the American Civil War. The story has it that he was born in Bavaria and was a prisoner and starving — he begged a guard for one last pickle before he died. The guard took pity on him and gave him a pickle and the pickle gave him the mental and physical strength to live on!
Another Story concerns St. Nicholas. The tale goes that two Spanish boys, traveling home for the holidays, stopped at an inn for the night, but the evil innkeeper killed the boys and put them in a pickle barrel. That evening, St. Nicholas stopped at the same inn, and found the boys in the barrel and miraculously brought them back to life.
I wasn’t aware of it, but some families do have the tradition of hanging the pickle on the tree, with the first person/child to find it getting a present. My research found a number of recent stories about “Christmas Pickels,” like… “On Christmas Eve, after the children had fallen asleep, the parents sneaked downstairs and hid the pickle in the boughs of the tree. Because of its green color, it blended into the evergreen and was hard to spot. The first child to find the ornament on Christmas morning was granted the privilege of unwrapping a special gift from under the tree.”
I figure the true story of how the pickle ornament became a mainstay in many homes remains a mystery. Even though some of the stories are interesting, I suspect an old article that I read probably is closest to being the truth… in the 1880s Woolworth stores started selling glass ornaments imported from Germany and some were in the shape of various fruits and vegetables. Apparently pickles must have been among the selection. I think some salesman, stuck with a lot of pickle ornaments, invented the legend of the Christmas Pickle to increase sales.
— 30 —