Frederick News Post
Military Intelligence - Live trees sprucing up troops' holidays
Publish Date: 12/20/06
By Alison Walker

Overwhelming response from the families of local troops deployed to Iraq and area organizations is making their first holiday season away from home a little merrier.

A shoebox send-off Nov. 19 by friends and family of Dam Support Unit-3, based at FortDetrick, has kept the unit's Marines well stocked with the care packages' cookies and other goodies. The unit deployed in October.

On Christmas, the unit will be treated to a special dinner and operate on a rotating shift to give each Marine some down time, unit spokesman Capt. Christian Devine said.

At least seven Christmas trees and accompanying decorations have also found their way to the unit, thanks to a campaign that sprung up from a Westminster man's efforts to send a Christmas tree to his daughter, who is deployed to Iraq.

Jim Ward contacted U.S. Rep. Roscoe Bartlett's office to get the ball rolling on sending live Christmas trees to deployed troops.

Mr. Ward bought 75 2-foot tall trees in 6-inch deep pots, as well as lights and decorations, and the foundation covered shipping costs. More than 75 service members will get to enjoy the trees, though -- he estimates one tree will be shared by three service members.

Mr. Ward spent more than $500 buying this year's trees. He hopes to buy next year's trees wholesale cost to keep costs low. Home Depot provided this season's trees at a steep discount, Mr. Ward said, selling $8 trees for $1- $3 each.

Mr. Ward said he'd like to establish an "adopt a tree" program, allowing the public to buy the tree and decorations for less than $20.

With help from others, Mr. Ward said, he hopes to send trees to as many troops as possible next year, half to Iraq and half to Afghanistan, for as long as U.S troops are deployed there.

Shipping logistics and military regulations meant that trees had to be small and had to be addressed to individual service members. The trees were mailed by mid-November to arrive in Iraq by Christmas.

Trees for All the Troops
Md. Man's Medic Daughter Inspires His Holiday Mission
By Amit R. Paley
Washington Post Staff Writer

It's not easy to ship a Christmas tree to Iraq.

Jim Ward knows. In an elaborate and admittedly eccentric campaign dubbed Operation Christmas Tree, he managed to get 75 live conifers to homesick troops in Iraq and Afghanistan this winter. Now his effort is snowballing into a massive national drive to ensure that each of the 150,000 U.S. troops in the two war zones receives a tree next holiday season.

"These soldiers are risking their lives over there and can't even spend Christmas with their families," said Ward, 33, a truck driver from Westminster, Md., who delivers trees for a nursery. "Don't they at least deserve a Christmas tree to remind them of home while they're stuck there?"

Ward's Christmas tree effort started with one soldier: his daughter, Army Spec. Luisa Gonzalez, a 22-year-old medic who was deployed two months ago to a base north of Baghdad. When he thought of her alone on Christmas in battle-scarred Iraq, he decided that the best way to give her some holiday cheer was to finagle a Christmas tree there.

But how do you get a 5-foot-tall, 70-pound tree into a war zone?

Ward despaired. The U.S. Postal Service couldn't guarantee its safe delivery, and no one could think of another way to get a tree that big to the Middle East.

"Then one day I'm eating dinner, and it just dawned on me, and I was like, 'Whoa!' " he recalled. " 'The answer is Charlie Browns!' "

Charlie Browns, 2-foot-high trees named after the classic Christmas cartoon special in which one was featured, were small enough to be easily shipped inside a box. And at just $7.98 each, the trees were inexpensive enough that Ward could send them to dozens of other Americans fighting overseas.

He ended up shipping 35 trees to his daughter's company and the rest to Marines from Fort Detrick in Frederick and his brother-in-law's unit in Afghanistan. "It just kept bothering me that my daughter was going to get one and other people there weren't," Ward said.

The live potted conifers arrived in a box emblazoned with the logo Operation Christmas Tree, along with battery-operated lights -- for the soldier without access to electricity -- and sparkly ornaments.

"Everyone was just in shock. Here we are in the middle of Iraq, and suddenly it smells like Christmas," recalled Gonzalez, who joined the Army to pay for school and wants to be a doctor. "And nobody could believe that the trees were actually alive. Eventually I had to say, 'Please take them out of the box and water them or they'll die!' "

A half-dozen letters of thanks have arrived at the Ward home. "Your care for my soldiers is greatly appreciated," wrote Capt. Bryan Hunsaker, Gonzalez's company commander. "Your kindness provided a piece of home to our young men and women who could not be with their families this year because of their commitment to fight the war on terrorism."

Ward has set up a Web site, http://www.operationchristmastree.com, to raise money to send trees to every member of the military in Iraq and Afghanistan next year. He spent almost $600 this winter (which was matched by the District-based Armed Forces Foundation), but the expanded operation will cost tens of thousands more.

But Gonzalez is convinced fate is smiling on the drive: Gonzalez was randomly assigned a two-week leave that just happens to include Dec. 25.

Maybe it's karma. Or perhaps a Christmas miracle.

"Whatever it is," Ward said, "having my daughter home is the best Christmas present I could ask for."