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
Franklin Pierce Rice (later to become the Worcester Historical Museum), Rice was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in 1906. Rice was also a member of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, the Worcester Natural History Society (serving as director from 1894 to 1909), and the Bunker Hill Monument Association. Rice died on 3 January 1919 in Worcester, Massachusetts. Franklin Pierce Rice was a direct patrilineal descendant of Edmund Rice, an English immigrant to Massachusetts Bay Colony, as follows: Franklin Pierce Rice Franklin Pierce Rice (1852–1919) was a self-taught printer and publisher who transcribed and printed and preserved vital records from Massachusetts