This spruce is ready for its star turn in the big city.
This Rockefeller Center Christmas tree has begun its trip to Manhattan — where it will serve as a heart-felt tribute to a beloved nurse whose Yuletide spirit was as strong as the mighty bough itself.
The 74-foot-tall, 11-ton Norway spruce was taken down Thursday with crane at the West Stockbridge, Mass. home of Earl Albert, who provided the prodigious pine in honor of his Christmas-obsessed late mother, Lesley, who died at age 78.
Albert was approached about providing the tree by Rockefeller Center’s head groundskeeper in 2020 — and he realized it could stand as a memorial for her, since she had passed away that year during the COVID-19 pandemic and didn’t get a proper burial, the couple told wnyt.com
“She was a huge pillar in this community,” Shawn Albert told the station. “We weren’t able to have a funeral because it was COVID.”
“She didn’t get the send-off she deserved, so this is it,” she said of the tree’s tribute to her mother-in-law.
Lesley— a part-time school nurse who previously owned a grocery store with her husband — was known for her generous spirit and throwing “amazing Christmas parties,” according to her obituary.
“She especially loved Christmas and the Fourth of July, and celebrated both with grandeur. How many people decorate a Christmas and a Fourth of July tree?” her obit reads.
The colossal conifer — which will be pitched and dressed with dazzling 50,000 multi-colored lights on Saturday — is the first Rockefeller Center Christmas tree grown outside New York State since 1959.
It was first spotted in the couple’s front yard by Rockefeller Center’s head gardener, Erik Pauze, as he drove through the tiny town, roughly 140 miles from the Big Apple, in 2020.
Locals and tourists have since flocked to the home after word got out about the fabulous fir’s celebrity status.
“It’s awesome. The little town’s famous now,” Wendy Lampro told CBS Boston as she directed traffic during the tree cutting.
Crowds of spectators sporting Santa hats and festive sweaters gathered Thursday morning to watch workers cut down the massive tree.
Carolers dressed as elves from the Monument Mountain Regional High School choir in Great Barrington belted Holiday songs as the spruce was loaded for its trek south.
“It’s a gorgeous landmark, but it’s going to have a new life in Rockefeller Center for the holidays,” choir director Julie Bickford said.
The tree will be lit and topped with a Swarovski crystal star during the “Christmas in Rockefeller Center” event on Dec. 4, and will stay up through mid-January.
With Post wires.
