A big, smelly tree celebrates big-hearted neighbours.
It's only a big, old, smelly tree, but you'd think it was whooping crane's egg, a Ming Dynasty vase or crumbling papyrus from an Egyptian pyramid. "We certainly have to treat it with a lot of care," explained Ross Pentz of the Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources. "It's actually packaged standing." Usually a balsam fur or white spruce, 50-feet tall and weighing more than 4,000 pounds, the tree is so hefty the felling crew begins by clearing enough space around it for heavy equipment. Then, to prevent breakage during shipping, they tie down every branch. These steps keep two dozen workers busy for a whole day.
A certified tree feller brings the big gift down, but it doesn't crash like mere pulpwood. From the top of an excavator, a harness grips it then lowers it, as gently as you please. A fair-sized crowd - including schoolchildren, the owners of the land where the tree grew for most of a century and TV news teams - watches this operation, and also the loading of the big, old, smelly tree onto a flatbed truck. Led and trailed by vehicles with flashing lights, as though the tree were Her Majesty the Queen, the truck proceeds to the Halifax waterfront. There, longshoremen transfer it to a container for a free ocean voyage aboard an SPM Marine Inc. ship. Three days later, the tree arrives dockside in Boston.
The stevedores there, who handle 100,000 containers a year, are a hard-boiled bunch, but last December port boss Ed Chrisom said, "This simple, beautiful tree touches us all. We have had such an intense atmosphere here since September 11, 2001, with so much increased security. No other container brings as much happiness to us. We all stop what we are doing and just focus on the tree." Ray's Trucking then does what it has done every year for more than three decades. It gives the big, old, smelly tree a free trip to the heart of the city. A motorcade of cops escorts the tractor-trailer to the Boston Common. Gangway! Stand back, folks! Important visitor riding into town!
At the Common, Bostonians erect the tree and lavishly decorate it. Then, on the right night, when Nova Scotian entertainers sing and dance for the 20,000 Massachusetts folks who show up every year to join the fun, the mayor pulls a switch and, on the boughs of the big, old, smelly tree, 18,000 lights officially declare the Christmas season has begun. The crowd releases a roar of approval.
The right night is close to December 6. For it was on that day, in 1917, that the Halifax Explosion killed nearly 2,000 men, women and children, injured 9,000 more, flattened 1,600 buildings and, with a howling blizzard descending on the city, left thousands homeless. The response by Massachusetts to this catastrophe was amazingly fast, efficient and open-handed. Even before the day of horror was over, a complete relief train began to chug from Boston to Halifax. It carried medical supplies, 13 doctors, a dozen nurses, six specialists from the American Red Cross, railroad officials and other volunteers. The trip did not go smoothly. The train ran into ferocious weather north of Truro; only the most heroic shovelling by local men cleared a mountain of snow from the track. It finally rolled into Halifax early on December 8, but this was only the beginning of miraculous help from Massachusetts.
Within days, glass, putty, lumber, quilts, chocolates, cigarettes, toys for children and 10 "new automobile trucks" all arrived from the Bay State. So did glaziers, carpenters, painters, telephone and telegraph repairmen. In goods and in money, the state came up with more than $750,000 for Halifax, a sum equivalent to $10 million in 2004 currency. As part of a fundraising effort that saw Massachusetts folks dig into their pockets for another $700,000, worth more than $9 million in today's dollars, the Boston Symphony Orchestra held a benefit concert. On Sunday afternoon, December 16, 1917, two of the most adored performers in the world, soprano Nellie Melba and violinist Fritz Kreisler, donated their talents to the Halifax cause.
Eight days earlier, when Canadian railway executive C.A. Hayes greeted the volunteers on that first train from Boston, he burst into tears, and blurted, "Just like the people of good old Massachusetts."
More than half a century later, in 1971, Nova Scotia decided it was time to say, "Thank you." It sent to Boston the biggest and shapeliest Christmas tree it could find in bluenose country, and has continued to do so every year since.
The last survivors of the Halifax Explosion will soon be gone. But as long as Nova Scotia keeps shipping to Boston that big, old, smelly tree, the people of Massachusetts will be hearing about the time their proud state not only sent to Halifax the best message a devastated city can ever hear - "Help is on the way" - but proved in spades that it meant what it said. Merry Christmas, Bean Town, and a Happy New Year!