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You are here: Home / Photo Blogging / Ghosts of Holidays Past: Christmas at Rockefeller Center Edition

Ghosts of Holidays Past: Christmas at Rockefeller Center Edition

by WaterGirl|  January 1, 202110:00 pm| 14 Comments

This post is in: Ghost of Holidays Past, On The Road, On The Road After Dark, Photo Blogging

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On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.

From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.

Submit Your Photos

randy khan

My wife and I have a regular holiday season trip to New York City, and we go by Rockefeller Center regularly.  I thought it would be fun to share photos of the Rockefeller Center trees from over the years.

A funny thing:  They’re all from the north side of the plaza.  I don’t know why.

On The Road - randy khan - Christmas at Rockefeller Center 6
Rockefeller Center, New York, New York.December 12, 2009

These are all in chronological order.  This is the first one I have.

On The Road - randy khan - Christmas at Rockefeller Center 5
Rockefeller Center, New York, New YorkDecember 11, 2010

2010.  A little closer this time.

On The Road - randy khan - Christmas at Rockefeller Center 4
Rockefeller Center, New York, New YorkDecember 13, 2014

2014.  Some decorations in the foreground.

On The Road - randy khan - Christmas at Rockefeller Center 3
Rockefeller Center, New York, New YorkDecember 12, 2015

2015

On The Road - randy khan - Christmas at Rockefeller Center 2
Rockefeller Center, New York, New YorkDecember 10, 2016

2016.  Putting this together, I enjoyed seeing how the trees are different year to year

On The Road - randy khan - Christmas at Rockefeller Center 1
Rockefeller Center, New York, New YorkDecember 8, 2017

2017

On The Road - randy khan - Christmas at Rockefeller Center
Rockefeller Center, New York, New YorkDecember 8, 2018

2018.  The lights changed.  I think they went to LEDs.  They’re definitely much brighter.

With any luck, we’ll get to come back next year and I will take another photo of the tree.

[editor’s note: this is the end of Randy Khan’s photos. The next one is from Kattails.

Ghosts of Holidays Past: Christmas at Rockefeller Center Edition
kattails at Rockefeller Center in 1962 or 1963

A few days ago, some of us at BJ were talking about visiting NYC back in the day.  This is Dad, my sister, and me at Rockefeller Center, probably 1962 or ’63.

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Reader Interactions

14Comments

  1. 1.

    Debbie(Aussie)

    January 1, 2021 at 10:19 pm

    Like the Christmas tree photos. Something definitely changed in 2018.
    Am enjoying these retrospectives.

  2. 2.

    Barbara

    January 1, 2021 at 10:20 pm

    I was there two years ago and then last year as well. It is special.

  3. 3.

    JanieM

    January 1, 2021 at 10:26 pm

    It is interesting how they change from one year to the next. And that 2018 one just leaps off the screen, it’s so different — not just LEDs, but the shifting of the dominant color toward more orange-y shades.

    I drive around looking at lights each year — there aren’t that many here in the boonies of rural Maine, so the people who make a lot of effort are all the more appreciated. My favorite color scheme is mixed colors with a slight preponderance of blue. In recent years the mixed-color strings I’ve found for my own use have had weak or no blue, so I started buying all-blue strings to mix in.

    So sue me. ;-)

    But more seriously, I too am enjoying the holiday memories. Thanks to everyone who posted!

  4. 4.

    JanieM

    January 1, 2021 at 10:31 pm

    P.S. I know we’re all having these reactions, but I’m thinking back to a year ago and trying to imagine what I would have said if you’d told me that on 1/1/21 I’d look at pictures of crowds in Rockefeller Center (or anywhere) and wonder what planet they were taken on.

  5. 5.

    debbie

    January 1, 2021 at 10:37 pm

    God, I loved visiting that tree. It’s amazing how they can turn the scraggliest tree (and this year’s sure was) into these jewels.

  6. 6.

    Luciamia

    January 1, 2021 at 11:02 pm

    One year my Mom and I went in to see the Rockefeller tree Then walked up Fifth ave. looking at the big window displays. Finished up with tea at the Plaza hotel. Love remembering that.

  7. 7.

    WaterGirl

    January 1, 2021 at 11:08 pm

    This is the last of the holiday series, but I have really enjoyed it.  Loved seeing the kids in awe of santas and kitties and their very own kitchen stoves.  I saved last night’s set and tonight’s sets for last because they seemed most like New Year’s Eve.

    Thanks again to everyone who contributed.

    Happy New Year, everybody!

  8. 8.

    Kattails

    January 1, 2021 at 11:24 pm

    Thanks for all your work, WaterGirl.

    Great shots of the trees.  It’s been ages since I’ve been in any city for Christmas but I especially remember NYC for the amazing window displays, the smells–chestnut vendors, hot pretzels; taxi noise, subway rumbling and the shriek of brakes, the wind tunneling down those streets. Really going to have to make a trip down one of these years.

  9. 9.

    RedDirtGirl

    January 1, 2021 at 11:54 pm

    Wonderful retrospective. The tree from 2014 really speaks to me.

  10. 10.

    CaseyL

    January 2, 2021 at 12:03 am

    I have a very dim and distant memory of going to Rockefeller Center as a child for a winter festival – which puzzles the heck out of me, as I have no other memories of going to NYC at that age.

    I’ve really enjoyed this series.  Thanks so much for thinking of it, and thanks to everyone who submitted photos and stories!

  11. 11.

    Origuy

    January 2, 2021 at 12:31 am

    Last night we had the channel on that plays music and displays little fun facts. I learned how the tradition of the Rockefeller Center tree started.

    On Christmas Eve, 1931, at the height of the Great Depression, workers at the Rockefeller Center construction site decided to pool their money together to buy a Christmas tree to lift their spirits. It was a 20-foot balsam fir that they decorated with handmade garland and strings of cranberries from their families. The men lined up at the tree to receive their paychecks.

  12. 12.

    Comrade Colette

    January 2, 2021 at 12:33 am

    Although not a Christmassing household ourselves, we’ve always enjoyed going to downtown San Francisco in December to see the Union Square Christmas tree and all the decorations in the big stores and office buildings. I really missed that this year. Thanks for a bit of vicarious light.

    Also, I’m a bit stunned at the blatant display of Dodgers-logo gang colors in the 2015 pic. That kinda thing could get you shot in SF. New York must be more safe and tolerant than Fox News told me.

  13. 13.

    randy khan

    January 2, 2021 at 8:47 am

    The Kattails photo is so much fun.  I love the matching coats.

  14. 14.

    JanieM

    January 2, 2021 at 9:16 am

    @randy khan:  Just realized this morning: Kattails’s picture brings us the same priceless look as in the last pic in this set — like, maybe it wasn’t about Santa Claus so much as a certain skeptical approach to the world in general? ;-)

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