White House Hanukkah Party the Frontier". For two centuries after the time of the story about George Washington and Hanukkah, Christmas was the only winter religious holiday officially recognized by the White House. In 1923, President Calvin Coolidge began lighting an official White House Christmas Tree, and also delivered the first formal presidential message for the holiday. In 1927, his proclamation included the statement that, "Christmas is not a time or a season, but a state of mind". Focusing on the holiday's message, he continued, would guarantee that "there will be born in us a Savior and over us will shine a star sending
North Lawn (White House) "carpet" style flower bedding punctuated by tropical plants borrowed from the White House glass houses. President Theodore Roosevelt, who had engaged the architectural firm of McKim, Mead, and White to reconfigure and rebuild part of the White House in 1902, was induced to simplify the grounds, removing what was increasingly seen as Victorian clutter. The bedding scheme on the North Lawn was greatly simplified. Later, in 1934, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt engaged Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr. to evaluate the grounds and recommend changes. Olmsted understood the need to offer presidents and their families a modicum of privacy balancing with the