Ann:

One of the things I remember from when I was a kid was our fire department's annual 12th night celebration. All the families in the community would bring their dried-out Christmas trees and we'd pile 'em up in the field beside the station house and torch them.

The Ladies Auxiliary (this was back in the days before the men-only hierarchy of the FD would even think of admitting women to membership) would serve hot chocolate, cookies, etc., and the men would clandestinely pass a bottle around. The last year I was there for it we had over a thousand trees. That makes a HELL of a fire.

Now, of course, it's illegal to burn a pile of leaves.




TEd