massive Rockefeller Center Christmas tree<\/a> was lifted into place in the Midtown hub Saturday, marking the official start of the holiday season.<\/p>\nA crowd swarmed the 75-foot-tall fir in the hour before the tree took its traditional spot in the well-known square, despite some early rain showers.<\/p>\n
The Rockefeller Center tree was lifted into place Saturday morning. <\/p>\n
This year\u2019s iconic Rockefeller Center Christmas tree stands at 75 feet tall.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s surreal! I\u2019ve seen it up at Christmas time, but to see the process is cool,\u201d said Leanne Garza, 36, who planned a vacation to the Big Apple with friend Kaissa Trevino from South Texas just to see the tree.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s going to be part of our memories of being in New York City for sure!\u201d<\/p>\n
Trevino, 33, agreed.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is my first time. I\u2019m really excited to see it go up. [Since] I was a kid, I\u2019ve always wanted to see it,\u201d Trevino said.<\/p>\n
The 75-foot-tall fir was unveiled in its traditional spot in the well-known in the early rainy hours.<\/p>\n
\u201cI knew it would be big, but not this big.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pennsylvania mom Jessica Olson, and her college student daughter Bailey watched crews of workers prepare the tree for placement, calling it \u201cexciting.\u201d<\/p>\n
Judy Russ and her son, Liam, were on hand as the tree made its grand arrival. <\/p>\n
Workers helped guide the tree into place in Rockefeller Center as a crowd looks on.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t think it was real. I never realized it was such a big tree, it\u2019s just incredible,\u201d said Bailey, 18. \u201cI\u2019m excited to see what it looks like when it\u2019s up and all fluffed out. It\u2019s gonna be so gorgeous!\u201d<\/p>\n
Her mother was also impressed.<\/p>\n
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\u201cIt\u2019s neat to see the ones involved under the tree. There is a whole crew of people you wouldn\u2019t think would be there to help pick up the tree,\u201d the 48-year-old said. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt feels like the start of the Christmas season. It puts you in a festive mood.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Rockefeller Christmas Tree arrived in the Big Apple overnight Saturday. Getty Images<\/p>\n
Dominique Perrot, a retired school teacher, woke up at 5 a.m. for what she called a \u201conce-in-a-lifetime experience.<\/p>\n
Perrot had never witnessed the Rockefeller Christmas tree make its seasonal debut, even though she lives just across the East River in Astoria.<\/p>\n
\u201cI like the size, the length, the trip \u2014 where it came from, the excitement. I like to see it better this way. It\u2019s charming with the little pine cones.\u00a0I prefer to see it this way,\u201d said Perrot, 74.<\/p>\n
\u201cI decided to come because last year I saw pictures and videos of it slowly coming up the street. It looked so charming, so massive. It\u2019s like a big contrast \u2014 there is the New York City traffic and noise and every day craziness and then you have this big tree, representing quietness and calmness,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The tree hailed from upstate New York, where it grew for 75 years before it was cut down this week. AP<\/p>\n
The 75-foot Norway spruce made its arrival overnight, two days after it was chopped down from its longtime upstate home.<\/p>\n
The sprawling spruce was donated by Judy Russ and her 7-year-old son, Liam,<\/a> in honor of her beloved husband, Dan, who died in 2020 at just 32 years old.<\/p>\nHe and his wife had dreamed their tree might one day light up Rockefeller Center for the rest of the world, and Judy Russ made it her mission to make the vision a reality.<\/p>\n
The 75-year-old tree \u2014 planted on the couple\u2019s East Greenbush property by Dan Russ\u2019 great-grandparents \u2014 was chopped down on Thursday. <\/p>\n
It will officially light up with 50,000 bulbs at the annual lighting ceremony on Dec. 3.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rockefeller Center is getting its annual spruce-up. The massive Rockefeller Center Christmas tree was lifted into place in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33145,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9804,12879,57,9,24,55,197,54,56,12566,817,58],"class_list":["post-33144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-30-rockefeller-plaza","tag-christmas-in-rockefeller-center","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-life","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-ny","tag-rockefeller-center","tag-upstate-new-york","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33144"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33144\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}