The story of Redlands’ Deodars, and what we stand to lose

BY: JP Beall, Special to Community Forward Redlands

With graceful, sweeping branches and a name that means “timber of the gods,” the Deodar Cedar (Cedrus deodara) has a story as enchanting as its form. This Himalayan native arrived in California in 1885, when nearby Altadena’s town founder Capt. Frederick J. Woodbury planted 134 Deodar Cedars along Santa Rosa Avenue to line his estate—creating what we now know as Christmas Tree Lane. 

Not long after, descendants of these Altadena Deodars found their way to Redlands, the rare specimen attracting the attention of Redlands’ horticulturalists and plant collectors. Much of this legacy is thanks to Walter Hadley, a Yale-trained forester and one-time San Bernardino County Agricultural Inspector. 

Hadley gathered cones from Altadena and Pasadena trees and spread them across Redlands, where among the first to plant the trees as rare botanical specimens were the Smiley Brothers, which only further helped to popularize the tree in public locations around town. Because of their very particular climate needs, they remain rare in the U.S., but the tree took well to Redlands’ particular climate and soil.

The tree’s symmetric shape while young ultimately made it popular in different parts of the state, and at one time it earned the nickname the “California Christmas Tree,” which would ultimately drive the decision to include a pair on the grounds of the California Statehouse in Sacramento. At least one example of the Deodar being used as a Christmas tree in Redlands is in the Emmerson family of Emmerson-Bartlett Mortuary, who planted their live Christmas tree on their property near Center Street in the 1930s—the tree still stands on the property today.

Of course, two of Redlands’ most iconic specimens—nicknamed “Judson and Brown”—stand proudly at Cypress and Center, marking the intersection that our town founders initially envisioned as the town’s center and plaza, commemorated with a plaque the Redlands Area Historical Society played a role in placing. 

Today, the Deodars of Redlands are not only among the oldest in the state of California, but are also among the oldest in the nation. We see mature “trophy specimens” planted at historic homes, along historic streets—including one remaining line of Deodar street trees along Pioneer Avenue—in our more botanically focused public parks like Prospect and Smiley Parks, and even at Hillside Memorial Park, due to their symbolic association with immortality and heroes. 

Redlands’ indirect impact on the popularization of the Deodar statewide cannot be ignored, and our remaining, irreplaceable, mature tree stock are each pieces of California and American botanical history of great importance. These are plantings which were once contributing elements of our now lost 260-acre Canyon Crest Park, once famed as one of the world’s greatest botanical gardens for containing such rare and exotic plantings as these. They are of great sentimental value to all Redlanders, and it would be a misstep for city council and city staff to ignore that. 

Of course, we can only learn from the example of Altadena what it is to lose so much of a community’s historic fabric. Their Deodar Cedars happily were spared by the fire and are still among the few remaining cherished symbols in their community. Are Redlands’ historic Deodars on Pioneer Avenue fated to fall, not by fire, but by the irreverent and unknowing axe? Is one row of trees too much to ask in an era when we have lost so much?

John P. "JP" Beall is the Redlands Area Historical Society board vice president. He is a fifth-generation resident of Redlands and owner of Old California Botanicals.