LECESTERSHIRE, ENGLAND - Shirley Hall, daughter of Dorothy Grant who inherited the tree at age 84, pictured at her home in Leicestershire, England, holding a picture of her mother.
In an incredible story channeling the holiday spirit, a small Christmas tree that was originally purchased for pennies 103 years ago was sold for over £3,411, or $4,328, at an Oxfordshire auction last Friday, Dec.15.
According to an official release by the auction house Hansons Auctioneers, the facilitators of the sale, the tree was only evaluated at £60 to £80, or just around $76 to $102. However, an international bidding match reportedly ensued, resulting in the final hammer price reaching almost forty-two times the original evaluation.
In the release, the owner of the auction house Charles Hanson said: "The magic of Christmas lives on! The humblest Christmas tree in the world has a new home and we're delighted for both buyer and seller."
The Heartwarming Backstory of the 'Humble' Christmas Tree
Hanson credits the "moving" tale of the small tree and its original long-time owner as the catalyst for the bidding frenzy. The story itself revolves around Dorothy Grant, who was just eight years old when she first encountered the tree in 1920, at her home in Leicestershire, a lowland county in the East Midlands region of England.
The auction house said that, at the time, Grant was "wildly excited" about the arrival of the Christmas tree, eventually decorating it herself using cotton wool as faux snow, a fittingly modest bauble, and the only reasonable option during that period since decorative pieces were expensive after World War I.
"As simple as it was Dorothy loved that tree," Hanson said, and indeed, Grant treasured the tree for the remainder of her life until her eventual death in 2014, aging up to 101 years old. Afterward, her daughter Shirley Hall, who was 84 years old at the time, inherited the tree as part of the family tradition.
"It became a staple part of family celebrations for decades. The fact that it brought her such joy is humbling in itself. It reminds us that extravagance and excess are not required to capture the spirit of Christmas," Hanson shared.
Despite its resemblance to the initial mass-produced artificial trees sold by Woolworths, a popular department store chain, the auction house owner believed that the tree was produced by a different expensive London department store, citing its red-painted wooden base as the distinct factor that made it different.
"The seller decided to part with it to honor her mother's memory and to ensure it survives as a humble reminder of 1920s life - a boom-to-bust decade," he added.
