| arly Christmas trees were lighted with candles, | | | | Miniature Christmas Lights History. |
| then glass covers with candles inside or metal | | | | The miniature lights were conceived in 1895 by |
| lanterns with small wicks hung on the Christmas | | | | Ralph E. Morris, an employee of the new England |
| tree branches like ornaments to brighten up the | | | | telephone company. Morris’s idea for lights |
| Christmas tree. The early Christmas candles were | | | | occurred as he was looking at the tiny bulbs in |
| a fire hazard and buckets of water were usually | | | | the telephone switchboards. Today |
| kept nearby the Christmas tree just incase a fire | | | | American’s enjoy a variety of colorful |
| did start up. | | | | light bulb colors and shapes. In the 1930’s |
| Electric Christmas Lights Make Christmas Safer. | | | | the popular cartoon figure lights were used were |
| With the invention of the electric Christmas lights, | | | | use to decorate Christmas trees. |
| tree lighting became much safer and brighter. The | | | | In the mid 1940’s and into the |
| electric Christmas Lights are one of America's | | | | 1950’s the country was introduced to the |
| unique contributions to the Christmas holidays that | | | | American Christmas bubble lights. The Christmas |
| followed the invention of the incandescent electric | | | | bubble light bulbs had a liquid filled colored tube on |
| light bulbs with a carbonized filament in 1879. The | | | | top of the holiday light. When the Christmas |
| next development was the tungsten filament light | | | | bubble light bulbs heated up, bubbles would rise in |
| bulbs. Early Christmas tree lights were simply | | | | the Christmas bubble lights bulb tube. |
| night-lights strung together to make the light | | | | LED Holiday Lights History. |
| strings. Tungsten which produces the light gives a | | | | LED is short for “light emitting |
| whiter light and for the same amount of | | | | diode”. By definition the LED light bulb is a |
| electricity they give out almost three times as | | | | solid-state device that controls a current without |
| much light as the early carbon electric lights would | | | | heated filaments like tungsten in the light bulbs |
| have. The next improvement was the coiling of | | | | which are the most common today. LEDs are not |
| the tungsten which gave more filament in the | | | | bulbs or lamps in the true sense of the word. The |
| same space of the bulbs thus more light. It was | | | | LED lights are much more reliable than the |
| found that by using nitrogen-argon inside the bulbs | | | | tungsten bulbs. The entire unit is totally embedded |
| would extend the life of the lights and make the | | | | in an epoxy resin. This embedding makes an LED |
| lights more efficient. The nitron-argon filled | | | | light virtually indestructible. There are no loose or |
| tungsten bulbs are over twice as efficient as the | | | | moving parts within the solid epoxy light enclosure. |
| ordinary tungsten bulbs which has its filament in a | | | | They are brighter and can produce an infinite |
| vacuum. When general electric commercially | | | | number of colors. An LED light can burn 1,000 |
| introduced the Holiday Lights, they caught on | | | | continuous hours and the commercial Cree and |
| immediately. Edison electric soon followed with an | | | | Luxeon LEDs will last for 50,000 hours. The |
| electric Christmas lamp. New York city’s | | | | biggest advantage in the amount of electrical |
| first Christmas display of lights was shown in | | | | power an LED lights use versus a tungsten light |
| 1882. New Yorkers used eighty, red ,white, and | | | | bulb. A savings of up to 90% energy consumption |
| blue, flashing light bulb colors to light up the | | | | can be achieved. |
| Christmas holiday season. | | | | |