MILWAUKEE – Every year, one Milwaukee household receives the honor of saying they donated the city’s annual Christmas tree. This year’s harvest, a 64-foot tall Colorado Blue Spruce, drew a big reaction from Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson.
“This is an incredible specimen!” the Mayor exclaimed to me as the gargantuan 35-year-old pine was airlifted from its old home in the city’s Washington Heights neighborhood and placed on a trailer bound for Deer District, where it will be lit up December 5th. Decorations this year will be done in partnership with Milwaukee entertaining and styling expert David Caruso.
Unlike last year’s tree harvest on the city’s northwest side, which included a fresh coat of snow from a rare Halloween storm, this year’s tree featured no precipitation but did present a unique challenge for the Department of Public Works.
“This is the first time I’ve seen…where they had to actually climb the tree in order to cut it down, just because it was so gargantuan,” said Mayor Johnson Tuesday. Nevertheless, the harvest went off without a hitch, thanks to the efforts of the roughly dozen city workers handling cutting, removal, and transport of the tree.
2024 marks the 111th year of the Christmas tree lighting in Milwaukee, the longest-running official tree in the United States other than New York City’s.
This year the city is again partnering with Black Husky Brewing in the Riverwest neighborhood, who will take boughs from the tree to create a holiday beer. Proceeds from the sale of that beer will benefit the Milwaukee Urban Forestry Fund.
As for the spot left over by today’s harvest, homeowner Andy Yeager tells me he plans to convert the space into a raking garden.
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