Altadena’s Christmas Tree Lane Assn. depends on greater than 100 volunteers to put in its annual vacation gentle show and set up its free winter pageant and lighting ceremony, scheduled for Dec. 6 this 12 months.
However with the neighborhood in ruins and greater than half of its volunteers displaced by the Eaton hearth in January, will the affiliation have sufficient helpers — and coronary heart — to get the job achieved?
Really, says affiliation President Scott Wardlaw, the larger concern now could be whether or not the group will probably be deluged with volunteers when work begins this month hanging lengthy strands of lights on the large droopy limbs of the 135 deodar cedars that line both facet of Santa Rosa Avenue, a.ok.a. Christmas Tree Lane, for practically a mile.
The 135 deodar cedars lining either side of Santa Rosa Avenue, a.ok.a. Christmas Tree Lane, in Altadena survived just about intact after the Eaton hearth in January, apart from just a few massive branches that had been damaged by the fierce winds that fueled the fireplace.
(Jeanette Marantos / Los Angeles Occasions)
That’s why this 12 months — the occasion’s a hundred and fifth anniversary — affiliation leaders are asking for volunteers to enroll forward of time, Wardlaw stated, to allow them to make sure that they’ve sufficient helpers and sufficient jobs for these helpers over the following 10 to 12 weekends it usually takes to place up the lights.
The affiliation began getting inquiries this summer time from individuals round Southern California, stated Mikayla Arevalo, the affiliation’s volunteer coordinator and communications director. Folks wished to know if the bushes survived the fireplace that destroyed greater than 9,400 constructions in Altadena and whether or not they might assist the favored winter pageant and lighting ceremony return once more this 12 months.
One of many miracles of the fireplace is that the cedars did survive, largely intact apart from just a few limbs that had been damaged within the fierce winds. Some residents credit score the large bushes for sheltering the houses beneath from the wind-driven embers that destroyed many different constructions.
The lights had been nonetheless on the bushes when the winds started in January, however a number of strings had been damaged. Many of the affiliation’s tools survived in storage bins regardless of their proximity to different constructions that burned.
In November 2024, Christmas Tree Lane volunteers Casty Fortich, from left, and Temple Metropolis Excessive College scholar Endurance Cam attempt to swing strands of lights onto one of many huge deodar cedars that line the highway, whereas volunteer Feli Hernandez, far proper, waits with one other strand. Within the middle, Scott Wardlaw presents recommendation and encouragement.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Occasions)
Issues didn’t go so properly for Christmas Tree Lane’s longtime Santa, Jim Vitale. The 1905-era house, the place he and his spouse, artist Dale LaCasella, had lived since 1993, burned together with all their belongings.
Regardless of the aftermath of the fireplace, the longtime volunteers for the affiliation will probably be again this 12 months on the pageant, despite the fact that they now dwell 25 miles east in La Verne. Vitale and LaCasella began taking part in Santa and Mrs. Claus, respectively, for the winter pageant about 15 years in the past.
Jim Vitale sits in his lounge carrying his private Santa Claus costume in 2023, about 13 months earlier than his house and costume items had been destroyed within the Eaton hearth.
(Dale LaCasella)
Vitale’s elaborate Santa costume, together with his 130-year-old strand of brass sleigh bells and hand-carved belt, had been all destroyed within the hearth, together with LaCasella’s handmade green-and-red felt elf footwear and vest.
“We managed to leave the site with two cars, two laptops, our cat and the clothes on our backs,” Vitale stated. “All our buildings, my [backyard] winery, my wife’s studio in our old carriage house, my library with 10,000 volumes about architecture and the history of California … all gone.”
LaCasella, a retired lawyer, stated she and her husband determined in opposition to rebuilding “because we’re too old. I’m almost 80 and I decided I couldn’t wait two years in some temporary location” till the home was rebuilt. However she’s nonetheless very concerned in her outdated neighborhood because the president of the senior middle, which was destroyed within the hearth.
She drives into Altadena just a few days per week to show artwork lessons and assist discover a new place for the seniors to fulfill till the middle could be rebuilt.
Vitale, a retired house inspector and accessibility specialist for the state, is busy reassembling Santa costume components. He has performed Santa for years at varied places in Southern California, together with Riverside’s Mission Inn, however his daylong volunteer stint as Altadena’s Christmas Tree Lane Santa is dearest to his coronary heart.
Jim Vitale and his spouse, Dale LaCasella, go to the barren stays of their Altadena entrance yard in August, seven months after their 1905 Craftsman house and outbuildings had been destroyed by the Eaton hearth. They imagine they’re too outdated to rebuild, and now dwell in La Verne, 25 miles east.
(Marcus Ubungen / For The Occasions)
“As long as I can still walk and talk, and whether I live in La Verne or wherever, I’ll will always be their Santa until the Lord says, ‘Hang it up,’” Vitale stated. “It’s for the love of Altadena and the history behind Altadena. You see other [communities] where people aren’t talking to each other and they have walls all around, but that’s not what Altadena and Christmas Tree Lane are about. It’s about talking to your neighbors and welcoming people. There’s just a sense of pride you don’t see in other places, and I want to preserve that history and that feeling.”
It’s onerous to pinpoint what makes Christmas Tree Lane’s bare-bone gentle show so standard. Guests received’t expertise any flashing lights, dancing elves or blaring carols. It’s only a quiet drive beneath a close to mile of stately cedars bedecked with strings of multicolor lights.
“I think the simplicity is what really draws people,” Arevalo stated. “That and the tradition. … We’re a historical landmark, and I think people just love the small town feel. When you’re driving through, it seems like you’re out in the woods somewhere, not in a city. It just feels magical.”
A classic postcard bearing a 1947 postmark, from Occasions author and columnist Patt Morrison’s assortment, tells the story of Altadena’s Christmas Tree Lane. If that 12 months was the twenty second lighting, then the 100-year anniversary in 2025 is rapidly approaching.
Christmas Tree Lane attracts 1000’s of tourists yearly, who slowly drive for practically a mile beneath a quiet cover of huge cedar branches and lights. “I think the simplicity is what really draws people,” stated volunteer coordinator Mikayla Arevalo.
(Los Angeles Occasions)
However creating that magic requires weeks of strenuous work, Arevalo stated. Volunteers usually begin stringing lights the second weekend of September, however the begin date hasn’t been set but this 12 months as a result of the affiliation remains to be making an attempt to finalize its required permits with the county.
Volunteers work each Saturday and Sunday from 8 a.m. to midday till the work is completed, often by early November. The employees verify and substitute the big plastic bulbs on the lengthy strings of lights after which use pulleys and hoists to hold and generally muscle these lengthy strands of faceted lights onto the branches.
This 12 months, staff may even have to assemble new 15-foot-strands of lights as a result of many had been damaged through the windstorm that fueled the Eaton hearth, Wardlaw stated. Volunteers should be a minimum of age 13 to assist. Many native highschool college students are common volunteers on the light-stringing classes and earn the 40 volunteer hours they should graduate.
That’s how Warren and Isabelle Skidmore’s household obtained concerned a few years in the past, when their daughters Hannah, 19, and Tessa, 17, began serving to as freshmen at John Muir Excessive College. In the end, the women earned greater than 400 volunteer hours, primarily from engaged on Christmas Tree Lane.
Hannah Skidmore, 19, left, and her sister, Tessa, 17, have been devoted, longtime volunteers of Christmas Tree Lane and intend to proceed this 12 months though their Altadena house was destroyed within the Eaton hearth. They now dwell in Sierra Madre till their childhood house could be rebuilt.
(Marcus Ubungen / For The Occasions)
Initially, they confirmed up simply to get their hours, Hannah stated. However they quickly got here to understand that the work they had been doing was persevering with a convention that they had cherished as little children — and brought without any consideration, by no means realizing how many individuals it requires 12 months after 12 months to make it occur.
“When you see thousands of people show up [for the lighting ceremony], it feels good to know you helped make it happen,” Hannah stated.
Tessa stated she was initially motivated to place in all these further hours for the problem of incomes the 200-hour volunteer medallion supplied at the highschool, however by the top, she stated, “We were doing it for the love of being on the lane.”
It’s not just like the Skidmores aren’t busy. Their house — the one house the women have ever recognized — was one in all some 6,000 destroyed within the Eaton hearth, so now the household is principally tenting out in a Sierra Madre condominium till their home could be rebuilt. Warren, an astrophysicist, is performing because the subcontractor for his or her rebuilding challenge, however he additionally accepted a brand new job in Hawaii proper after the fireplace as deputy director of NASA’s Infrared Telescope Facility on the College of Hawaii.
Warren comes house to Altadena as many weekends as he can handle, however Isabelle stated she stayed in Sierra Madre to be his “boots on the ground,” ensuring the varied jobs are accomplished, whereas their daughters go to highschool at Pasadena Metropolis School.
Isabelle Skidmore, left, her husband, Warren, and their two daughters Hannah, 19, (within the tree) and Tessa, 17, have been longtime volunteers for Christmas Tree Lane and intend to proceed this 12 months.
(Marcus Ubungen / For The Occasions)
Tessa, who was the valedictorian at John Muir Excessive College in June (see her speech right here beginning at 45:40), entered faculty as a sophomore due to all the faculty credit she earned in highschool (“I like challenging myself,” she stated). Tessa desires a profession in legal justice, and Hannah is an aspiring graphic artist and musician who performs bass in a neighborhood band, Exit 23.
Regardless of their schedules, discovering time to work on Christmas Tree Lane feels extra necessary than ever this 12 months, Tessa and Hannah stated, as a result of they understand the custom might have been misplaced together with so many different issues destroyed within the hearth.
Hannah stated one in all her and her sister’s first ideas after the fireplace was concerning the destiny of Christmas Tree Lane.
“I just think this community, Altadena, is so special,” Hannah stated. “It’s like what Joni Mitchell says, ‘You don’t know what you have until it’s gone.’ That’s why we’re so tight-knit, even though we’ve been so dispersed. We know what we had, and that’s why it’s so valuable to us.”
