Christmas lights are lights used for decoration around
Christmas. The custom harks back to the use of
candles to decorate the
Christmas tree in upper-class homes in
18th-century Germany. Christmas trees displayed publicly and illuminated with electric lights became popular in the early 20th century. By the mid-20th century, it became customary to display strings of electric lights as Christmas decoration detached from the Christmas tree itself, along streets and buildings. In the United States, it became popular to outline private homes with such Christmas lights in
tract housing beginning in the 1960s. By the late 20th century, the custom had also been adopted in non-western countries, notably in
Japan.
The first known electrically illuminated Christmas tree was the creation of
Edward H. Johnson, an associate of inventor
Thomas Edison. While he was vice president of the
Edison Electric Light Company, a predecessor of today's
Con Edison electric utility, he had Christmas tree light bulbs especially made for him. He proudly displayed his Christmas tree, which was hand-
wired with 80 red, white and blue electric
incandescent light bulbs the size of walnuts, on December 22, 1882 at his home on Fifth Avenue in
New York City. Local newspapers ignored the story, seeing it as a publicity stunt. However, it was published by a
Detroit newspaper reporter, and Johnson has become widely regarded as the
Father of Electric Christmas Tree Lights. By 1900, businesses started stringing up Christmas lights behind their windows. Christmas lights were too expensive for the average person; as such, electric Christmas lights did not become the majority replacement for candles until 1930.
See Wikipedia for more history!
It started at the home of Carson Williams in Mason, Ohio. Carson had the brilliant idea (pardon the pun) to syncronise 16,000 Christmas lights to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. His video had over 10 million hits. Or maybe you have driven by a house before with lights set to music.