Lifestyle
Altadena’s Christmas Tree Lane survives. Volunteers hope to turn the lights on again
• Altadena’s 104-year holiday lighting tradition known as Christmas Tree Lane escaped damage from the fire despite a torrent of embers coming down on its historic deodar cedars.
• Fierce Santa Ana winds did break branches from some of the trees, but most on Santa Rosa Avenue — the real name of the street — appear unscathed.
• The lights are usually taken down every February, but the head of the volunteer association hopes they can be turned on again “to show we’re still here.”
The people who tend Altadena’s venerable deodar cedars have suffered incomprehensible community losses this week, but Santa Rosa Avenue, a.k.a. Christmas Tree Lane, is a tiny bright spot among the wreckage wrought by the Eaton fire.
Despite what residents described as a fiery rain of embers propelled by hurricane force winds, the street’s 135 cedars seemed unfazed by the fire. The raging Santa Ana winds have broken a few branches, but overall, the massive trees with their graceful drapey limbs seem fine, which means the community’s 104-year holiday light tradition can continue.
Tony Ward and his wife, Maureen, longtime residents of Santa Rosa Avenue and past presidents of the Christmas Tree Lane Assn., went out for dinner in Hastings Ranch on Jan. 7, after the power went out at their home.
Thousands of people turn out every year to drive under a nearly mile-long canopy of sparkly lights strung on 135 deodar cedars on Santa Rosa Avenue in Altadena, a 104-year, volunteer-led tradition known as Christmas Tree Lane.
(Los Angeles Times)
The wind was intense when they left “but there wasn’t any discussion on the media about a fire,” Ward said.
Their dinner outing was short. Before their meal was served, Ward said, “the waiter came up and apologized. He said, ‘We have to give you the meal to go because we have an evacuation order.’ ”
The Wards’ home of nearly 50 years is at the southern end of Santa Rosa Avenue, near Woodbury Road, about six miles west of Hastings Ranch. As the couple returned home and looked to the north, “we could see Eaton Canyon was totally involved in fire, from top to bottom, and we were flabbergasted. It happened so fast,” Ward said.
Once they got home, they began packing “all the things we could think of, photos and business records, into our car and van,” in case they had to evacuate, Ward said. “The wind was intense, and the smoke was just heavy, heavy, heavy.”
The gusting Santa Ana winds blew fiery embers throughout Altadena, including on Woodlyn Road, on Jan. 8 during the Eaton fire.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
The Wards have lived in their home for 50 years and never experienced this kind of fire event. Between the constant roar of the wind and the advancing flames, sleep was impossible that night.
They joined their neighbor standing watch outside “to see if anything flared up so we could run and stamp it out,” Ward said.
By 2:30 a.m. last Wednesday, “we noticed embers flying all the way down from way up in the [Angeles National] forest. They would strike the trees [the deodar cedars] and burst into little sparklers. And most of the embers went out, but this was something we’d never experienced before,” he said.
“And in addition to the wind roaring, there were very loud reports we could hear in the background, which we surmised to be exploding canisters of fuel for barbecues and outdoor space heater,” he added. “It was pretty scary because the wind was so intense, and the dust and ashes, everything was right in your eyes. And who thinks of wearing safety goggles? We had no idea that anything like this could happen so far away from the canyons and the national forest.”
When the evacuation order came at 5 a.m., the Wards finally left. They were able to return briefly last Thursday and found their home still standing. It turns out that most of the houses on Santa Rosa Avenue south of Mariposa Street escaped fire damage, although houses on adjoining streets were burned.
And the cedars, most of which were planted in the late 1880s, seemed fine.
A large broken branch from a deodar cedar hangs precariously from a string of lights on Santa Rosa Avenue the day after massive winds and the Eaton fire tore through Altadena.
(Jeanette Marantos / Los Angeles Times)
However, there is wind damage. A few large branches broken in the heavy winds dragged strings of lights with them to the street. But the trees didn’t burn, and it’s not clear why.
“They are pretty lusciously green,” said Cristhian Mace, a natural areas biologist for Los Angeles County Parks and Recreation, “which makes me think they were well irrigated, and that’s probably one of the factors that saved them. They weren’t dry and brittle, and when you look at cedar bark, it’s thick and somewhat fire resistant. … I don’t know how else to account for their resiliency.”
The trees are well tended by the Christmas Tree Lane Assn., but they are largely cared for by the homeowners on whose property the trees reside, said Assn. President Scott Wardlaw. During drought years, the association has taken steps to give the trees extra water, but usually, Wardlaw said, it has to warn homeowners against overwatering the deodar cedars. Too much water can lead to Armillaria root disease, a deadly form of root rot.
Preserving the trees is critical, because without the cedars, there is no Christmas Tree Lane.
In November 2024, volunteers use ropes and pulleys to hang long strings of holiday lights on Christmas Tree Lane’s deodar cedars. Casty Fortich, far left, and Temple City High School student Patience Cam, pull as Scott Wardlaw, president of the Altadena Christmas Tree Lane Assn., and Feli Hernandez, right, look on.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
It takes 10 weekends and more than a 100 volunteers to string those lights every year; volunteers begin their work in September to be ready for Altadena’s free winter festival and tree lighting event in early December. The same volunteers usually start taking the lights down for the year in February to avoid winter rains.
The festival is traditionally held in the parking area of the Altadena Public Library at the corner of Mariposa Street and Santa Rosa Avenue. Last week, several buildings at the intersection burned, including the Altadena Senior Center next door, but the library was saved.
The area lighting event that began in 1920 still has a small-town, old-fashioned feel, with booths and hot chocolate, local leaders making speeches and attendees walking the route once the lights are turned on. The Christmas Tree Lane display itself is pretty low-tech, with no music or special effects. But it still draws thousands of people every year for the simple pleasure of driving slowly for a near mile under a canopy of sparkly lights.
Wardlaw said at least 13 of the Christmas Tree Lane volunteers lost homes in the fire. Also, the local school that had let the association park its truck and store its container of equipment for free was destroyed in the fire.
Now the association is grappling with where it will store its truck and equipment, which didn’t burn in the fire.
The trick will be finding a new storage place the cash-strapped nonprofit can afford. “The cheapest storage units charge around $5 a day for a truck, nearly $1,900 a year, which we can’t afford for just parking,” Wardlaw said.
The association relies on annual $35 memberships and sponsors to cover its expenses, and several of its sponsors, including Altadena Hardware, St. Mark’s School, Pasadena Waldorf School and Western Fence Co., lost buildings in the fire.
Those losses have weighed heavy on Wardlaw, who, like most displaced Altadena residents, is chafing to get into the burned areas, presently closed to the public, to see what has been lost, and what, if anything, can be saved. The broken tree branches on the street will have to be cleared away, he said, and the strings of lights, many of which are likely broken, will have to be repaired or replaced.
The work will require volunteers, many of whom will be preoccupied by their own losses, Wardlaw acknowledged, but he sees the work ahead as a tiny act of defiance against all the fire’s terrible destruction.
“Something I want to do, if it’s feasible, is turn the lights on again as soon as possible,” he said, “Just so we can say, ‘We’re still here.’ ”
Millie Bobby Brown in the final season of Stranger Things.
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After five seasons and almost ten years, the saga of Netflix’s Stranger Things has reached its end. In a two-hour finale, we found out what happened to our heroes (including Millie Bobby Brown and Finn Wolfhard) when they set out to battle the forces of evil. The final season had new faces and new revelations, along with moments of friendship and conflict among the folks we’ve known and loved since the night Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) first disappeared. But did it stick the landing?
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JasonMartin
Adin Ross Disrespecting Doechii …
Will Not Be Tolerated!!!
Published
TMZ.com
JasonMartin is putting his foot down after hearing Adin Ross call Doechii a “bitch” one too many times … the culture’s not going for it in 2026!!!
TMZ Hip Hop caught up with JM in L.A. this week, and he says Adin being aggressively addressed is vital to preventing outsiders of Black culture from toeing the line in the future.
Adin Ross is lying about Doechii and one of the biggest Twitter Accounts is behind it… pic.twitter.com/VoAwGJefyV
— Mike Tee (@ItsMikeTee) January 5, 2026
@ItsMikeTee
Adin maintains Doechii targeted him on her new track, “Girl, Get Up,” when she blasted people labeling her “an industry plant” … and blamed Complex magazine for helping fuel the fire.
Joe Budden, Glasses Malone, Wack 100, and Top Dawg Entertainment execs have all chimed in on Adin’s comments, and Jason says it’s bigger than internet tough talk … and won’t allow Adin to hide behind religion or freedom of speech to drag Black women.
Adin went on to collaborate with Tekashi 6ix9ine and Cuff Em on an anti-Lil Tjay and Doechii song, but has since said he’ll stay out of the beef; his chat doesn’t matter to him, and it’s not that deep to him.
TMZ.com
War mongering isn’t Jason’s only goal this year. He released 5 albums — “A Hit Dog Gon Holla,“ “I Told You So,“ “Mafia Cafe,“ “O.T.,“ and “A Lonely Winter” — to close out the 4th quarter and just may be in the “Snowfall” reboot with his buddy, Buddy!!!
A firefighter works as homes burn during the Eaton fire in the Altadena area of Los Angeles County, Calif., on Jan. 7, 2025.
Josh Edelson/AFP via Getty Images
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Josh Edelson/AFP via Getty Images
On New Year’s Eve 2024, journalist Jacob Soboroff was sitting around a campfire with a friend when he made an offhand comment that would come back to haunt him: The last thing he wanted to do in the new year, Soboroff said, was cover a story that would require donning a fire-safe yellow suit.
Just one week later, Soboroff was dressed in the yellow suit, reporting live from a street corner in Los Angeles as fire tore through the Pacific Palisades, the community where he was raised.
“This was a place that I could navigate with my eyes closed,” Soboroff says of the neighborhood. “Every hallmark of my childhood I was watching carbonize in front of me. … There were firefighters there and first responders and other journalists there, but it was an extremely lonely, isolating experience to be standing there as everything I knew burned down around me in real time.”
In his new book, Firestorm: The Great Los Angeles Fires and America’s New Age of Disaster, Soboroff offers a minute-by-minute account of the catastrophe, told through the voices of firefighters, evacuees, scientists and political leaders. He says covering the wildfires was the most important assignment he’s ever undertaken.
“The experience of doing this is something that I don’t wish on anybody, but in a way I wish everybody could experience,” he says. “It’s given me insane reverence for our colleagues in the local news community here, who, I think, definitionally were exercising a public service in the street-level journalism that they were doing and are still doing. … It was actually beautiful to watch because they are as much a first responder on a frontline as anybody else.”
Interview highlights
On the experience of reporting from the fires
You’re choking with the smoke. And I almost feel guilty describing it from my vantage point because the firefighters would say things to me like: “My eyeballs were burning. We were laying flat on our stomach in the middle of the concrete street because it was so hot, it was the only way that we could open the hoses full bore and try to save anything that we could.” …
I could feel the heat on the back of my neck as we stood in front of these houses that I remember as the houses that cars and people would line up in front of for the annual Fourth of July parade or the road race that we would run through town. Trees were on fire behind us — we were at risk of structures falling at any given minute. It was pretty surreal because this is a place I had spent so much time as a child and going back to as an adult. … I had no choice but to just open my mouth and say what I saw to the millions of people that were watching us around the country.
On undocumented immigrants being central to rebuilding the city
These types of massive both humanitarian and natural disasters give us X-ray vision for a time into sort of the fissures that are underneath the surface in our society. And Los Angeles, in addition to being one of the most unequal cities between the rich and the poor, has more undocumented people than virtually any other city in the United States of America. Governor Newsom knew that with the policies of the incoming administration, some of the very people that would be responsible for the cleanup and the rebuilding of Los Angeles may end up in the crosshairs of national immigration policy. And I think that that was an understatement. …
Pablo Alvarado in the National Day Laborer Organizing Network said to me that often the first people into a disaster — the second responders after the first — are the day laborers. They went to Florida after Hurricane Andrew, to New Orleans after Katrina, and they’d be ready to go in Los Angeles. And I went out and I cleaned up Altadena and Pasadena with some of them in real time.
And only months later did this wide-scale immigration enforcement campaign begin … on the streets of LA as sort of the Petri dish, the guinea pig for expanding this across the country. And it’s not an exaggeration to say that the parking lots of Home Depots, where workers [were] looking to get involved in the rebuilding of Los Angeles, has been ground zero for that enforcement campaign.
On efforts to rebuild
The pace is slow and it’s sort of a hopscotch of development. And I think for people who do come back, for people who can afford to come back, it’s going to be a long road ahead. You’re going to have half the houses on your street under construction for years to come. And for people that do inhabit those homes, it’s going to an isolating experience. But there’s an effort underway to rebuild. …
There’s also a lot of for-sale signs. And that’s the sad reality of this, is that there are people who, whether it’s that they can’t afford to come back … or that they just can’t stomach it, I think, sadly, a lot people are not going to be returning to their homes.
On what the Palisades and Altadena look like today
They both look like very big construction sites in a way. There are still some facades, some ruins of the more historic buildings in the Palisades. … But mostly it’s just empty lots. And in Altadena, the same thing. If you drive by the hardware store, the outside is still there. But it’s a patchwork of empty lots. Homes now under construction. And lots and lots of workers. … There are still a handful of people who are living in both the Palisades and in Altadena, but for the most part, these are communities where you’ve got workers going in during the day and coming out at night. …
We have designed this community to be one that’s in the crosshairs of a fire just like the one we experienced and that we will certainly, certainly experience again, because nobody’s packing it up and leaving Los Angeles. People may not return to their communities after they’ve lost their homes, but the ship has sailed on living in the wildland urban interface in the second largest city in the country.
On seeing this story, personally, as his “most important assignment”
Jacob Soboroff is a correspondent for MS NOW, formerly MSNBC.
Jason Frank Rothenberg/HarperCollins
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Jason Frank Rothenberg/HarperCollins
I don’t think I realized at the time how badly I needed the connections that I made in the wake of the fire, both with the people who have lost homes and the firefighters, first responders who were out there, but also honestly with my own family, my immediate family, my wife and my kids, my mom and my dad and my siblings and myself. I think that this was a really hard year in LA, and I think in the wake of the fire, I was experiencing some level of despair as well. Then the ICE raids happened here and sort of turned our city upside down. And this book for me was just this amazing cathartic blessing of an opportunity to find community with people I don’t think I ever would have otherwise spent time with, and to reconnect with people who I hadn’t seen or heard from in forever.
Anna Bauman and Nico Wisler produced and edited this interview for broadcast. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Beth Novey adapted it for the web.
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