My wife found this article from the December, 1958 issue of "The Record," a customer-promotion magazine printed by Fireman's Fund Insurance Company. This is not reprinted with permission since I did not have time to trace down the correct parties to inquire. It is hoped that this is a reasonable "fair use" since this article is provided for information and education.
As far as I can tell, this fits the known facts of the subject, and shows that the origin of the Christmas Tree tradition is at least ostensibly based on an apocryphal myth of the Nativity, and is not specifically of pagan origin, as is constantly alleged each Christmas season. I'd encourage all Christians to become critical thinkers -- to "prove all things" ( 1 Thess 5:21) -- and to add corroborable facts to their unvarnished devotion to the LORD.
Reverend Schwan's "HEATHEN" TREE
By Robert Dale
It was Christmas Eve, 1851. Rev. Henry Schwan stood at the door of the Zion Church of Cleveland, Ohio, welcoming the hundred or so members of his new congregation.
When at last he closed the door, he walked slowly up the aisle toward a beautiful, green tree glistening in the light of candles - the first Christmas tree at an American Christmas service. There had been other trees in a few scattered homes, but none before had ever been placed in a church. The congregation stared.
After Rev. Schwan read the Gospel story of the Nativity, he felt closer to his people this Christmas than ever before. But those feelings boomeranged.
"What business did a foreigner have decorating a tree in honor of Christ?" demanded one man, not a member of Schwan's congregation.
"'Twas idolization, pure idolization!" another non-parishioner muttered.
"Blasphemous!" said a third. "We won't let it happen again next year!"
Finally, the outsiders talked of bringing Rev. Schwan's action to the attention of the sheriff, the mayor, the governor. But the townspeople were reminded that the Constitution of the United States guaranteed freedom of worship, even for the new immigrants, even to taking vulgar, candlelit trees into church at Christmas. Even so, one way remained to stop such practices - there was no law forcing Christians to do business with pagans.
The majority of Zion Church members were foreign-born and employed as shoemakers, butchers, clerks and grocers; they had but little money. If given to understand that the town's decent citizens would not tolerate heathen practices, wouldn't they themselves see that their absurd tree did not again blaze in a church in Cleveland?
A week after the Christmas service, one of the Zion Church members, a shoemaker, came up to Rev. Schwan, saying, "Because I worshiped your heathen tree, I've lost all my customers."
"The Christmas tree," insisted the pastor, "is by no means heathenish. Nor are we worshiping it."
"That's what I tell my customers," cried the shoemaker, "but they will not listen to me."
"And they refuse to buy my meat," said the butcher, "because I helped you cut the tree."
Rev. Schwan began worrying. He went to Rev. Edwin Canfield whose church was almost as small as Zion. At his birthplace, in the city of Hanover, Rev. Schwan explained, Christmas was not true Christmas without a tree.
"At least, it's a pretty innovation," said Pastor Canfield.
"In Europe, it's a tradition, not an innovation," Schwan broke in.
"Show me proof," said Pastor Canfield, "and next year I will light a tree myself."
Rev. Schwan immediately sent letters to all American ministers he knew, asking if the Christmas tree was really unknown in America. Replies came from many, all with the same sad news. People who had come from abroad knew of the custom, but Americans at large had never heard of the Christmas tree.
Then Pastor Schwan began looking up new immigrants, many of whom were passing through Cleveland. A man from Cincinnati told him of the first Christmas tree in Vienna, lighted in 1816 by Princess Henriette. The practice spread rapidly in Vienna.
From another stranger he heard that Christmas in Sweden was never celebrated without a tree, the first one dating back to 1817. From another source he found that England had its first Christmas tree in 1841, inaugurated by Queen Victoria's husband, Prince Albert, who brought the custom from Germany.
Then Rev. Schwan made a final discovery: Into the home of Fred Imgard in Wooster, Ohio, on Holy Eve of 1847, a spruce tree was taken - the first Christmas tree in America, decorated with paper dolls and ornaments. The children were overcome with joy. The beautiful idea had spread in Wooster.
Rev. Schwan called a meeting of leading members of the community, including a reporter whose paper had termed the tree in Zion Church a "nonsensical, asinine, moronic absurdity, besides being silly." The pastor recited the facts he had gathered. His audience was impressed, public sentiment was beginning to change, but Rev. Schwan himself wanted proof that the Christmas tree was of Christian origin. Just before Christmas, 1852, he called on Pastor Canfield once again, to admit failure. His good friend, however, had just returned from Canada where he had learned from a monk about an old legend written down in a Sicilian monastery in the Middle Ages.
The legend told of the holy night when Our Lord was born. All creatures came to worship at Bethlehem. And the trees did likewise. None of the other trees came so far as the least among them, a small spruce. It was so weary that it could hardly stand, and the bigger, leafy trees all but obscured it. But the stars took pity on it, and a rain of them fell from Heaven, and the bright Christmas star alighted in the top of the spruce. And the Child in the manger saw the spruce and blessed it with a smile.
"And so," said Pastor Canfield, "long before the first known Christmas trees, a pious man envisioned the evergreen as a symbol of the Father's everlasting love, and the Christ Child's star-bedecked birthday gift as a sign from Heaven, and he penned the miracle for posterity."
Rev. Schwan received congratulations for his long studies. And as Christmas approached he felt the deepening of friendships. On the Christmas Eve of 1852, one year after the uproar of the Christmas tree in Zion Church, many in Cleveland celebrated by decorating a Christmas tree. Stepping outside the door of Zion Church, Rev. Schwan saw a tree of exceptional beauty. Silvery angel's hair flew from its top; little glass bells dangled from the branches, ringing in the wind; red apples and gilded nuts danced between the boughs on which sat white candles; and a waxen Christ Child leaned against the trunk, its hand raised in a blessing.
Beside the tree stood two smiling children. "Reverend Canfield sent us to wish you a Merry Christmas," one of them said. "And this tree is a Christmas present for your church."
Since that day, the custom of decorating Christmas trees in churches has spread from Cleveland through America.