Oh Tannenbaum

Looks like I'm not the only one nostaglic over those wonderful aluminum Christmas trees. According to the ABC News, the people of Manitowoc, Wisconsin say that shiny artificial trees are ready for comeback. "Manitowoc was put on the map nationally through this tree," says Jerry Waak, who once ran the sales force at the Aluminum Specialty Company. The downtown factory closed years ago.

There were millions of the trees sold in 60's and 70's. Now days, the only place you'll find them is on eBay, as collectors items. My family had one of those rotating lights that shined different colors on the tree. I can still remember marveling at how the magically changed colors.

Some blame the demise of aluminum Christmas trees on Charles Schultz, who satirized the tree in, "A Charlie Brown Christmas." In that classic, Lucy tells Charlie Brown to " get the biggest aluminum tree you can find -- maybe paint it pink." Funny, as a kid that sounded like a great idea to me, I wasn't smart enough to know I was being satirized. Truthfully, now days, I'm still not sure I'm smart enough to know when I'm being satirized.

Now some may find the aluminum Christmas tree rather kitschy. That's fine, you can have your dead tree and spend January vacuuming up needles. Me, I'm with aluminum tree collector Lisa Genske who said, "Anyone can go out in the forest and cut a tree, but this is history."