The first outdoor Christmas tree in Oakdale, California was widely used to promote the wonderful California climate.
This is a portrait of the
O.J. and J.B. Ames families at the homestead located in the countryside
outside Oakdale with their first outdoor Christmas tree. The photo was
used nationwide to showcase the mild winters in California. In this
moment captured in 1902 the Ames children were not happy about being out
in the cold to document their family for history.
Two Ames brothers migrated over from Maine and met two McDaniel sister is Oakdale, California and married. The two families lived next door to each other for many years and also worked together during this time. In this picture Otis Jackman Ames and his wife Rosa Beatrice Ames are on the right and his brother's family, James Buchanan Ames and wife Sarah Ellen Ames are on the left.
Otis Jackman and Rosa Beatrice Ames are my great-grandparents. My grandpa Edward Jackman Ames was born in 1916, fourteen years after this picture was taken.
