Blue Room Christmas Tree, 1975

This photograph of the official White House Christmas Tree in the Blue Room was taken by National Geographic photographer Joseph H. Bailey on December 16, 1975. In 1975, First Lady Betty Ford selected the theme "An Old-Fashioned Christmas in America," also referred to as "A Williamsburg Children's Christmas" as the theme for the Christmas tree. Colonial Williamsburg staff and volunteers contributed a majority of the nearly 3,000 ornaments that decorated the Douglas fir, using materials such as dried flowers and fruit, acorns, pinecones, straw, and yarn. The Museum of American Folk Art lent the White House ten antique portraits of children to place on the walls of the Blue Room, as well as an assortment of old toys, dolls, cradles, a train, rocking horse, and a wagon to place around the base of the tree.