First electric Christmas tree lights

The first electric Christmas tree lights were assembled by Edward H Johnson (USA) at his home in New York City, USA. Johnson's remarkable Christmas tree (described at the time as "presenting a most picturesque and uncanny aspect") was descrbied by a reporter from the Detroit Post & Tribune on 22 December 1882.

Edward Johnson was a well-known inventor and long-time associate of Thomas Edison. At the time, Johnson was the vice president of the Edison Illuminating Company, which had opened the first commercial power station in the United States – at Pearl Street in downtown Manhattan – on 4 September that same year. Johnson's home at 139 East Thirty-Sixth Street was an informal showcase for the wonders of electricity. Johnson would give reporters and famous guests tours of his home, showing off the new technologies he had installed.

The house at 139 East 36th was lit throughout with electrical lights, with featured various electrically-powered labor-saving devices, including sewing machines and silver polishers, as well as electrical fire and burglar alarms. It also had more whimsical uses of electricity including an electric train set and a drumming automaton. As it was far outside the transmission range of the Pearl Street Station (whose DC generators could only supply power to an area that stretched roughly from Wall Street to the Brooklyn Bridge), these marvels were powered by a privately operated generator in the basement.

The Christmas tree was typical of the devices in Johnson's home, in that it made full use of all the technology he had at his disposal. Instead of a simple string of lights, the tree was mounted on a rotating base – powered by a dynamo – and as it turned, the live wire from the generator made contact with conductors attached to the base. Each conductor was connected to a different colored set of lights, meaning that the tree switched between different colours and patterns of light as it turned.