1 jan 1937 ano - John Davison Rockefeller recollects on the Rockefeller Tree Tragedy

Descrição:

"During the first winter of the Center's construction, the workers set up a Christmas tree just outside the entrance. It was an uncanny site, to see a green fir in the middle of what appeared to be no man's land. But this tree, humbly ordained with strings of cranberries, buttons, and tin cans, greatly affected me. It demonstrated that even in the darkest of times, the American people will light the beacons of hope. I thought it could be the start of a great and inspiring tradition, so I travelled north to Babylon in search of a Christmas tree for the following year."

"For the past two years, I have seldom mentioned the tragedy that occurred at the Center. Many have taken offense to my silence, claiming it to be the result of my desensitization to workplace accidents. Indeed, I have seen enough accidents for three lifetimes, but nothing could have prepared me for what happened at the Center. For some time now, my friends have blamed the Center's original construction workers for the tragedy, since it was their very own Christmas tree that had started the whole tradition. The truth is that their tree brought joy and wonder to the public. It was my tree, and my tree alone, that brought about the unprecedented loss."

"It is only natural for the reader, at this point, to wonder why the incident has been referred to as a tragedy. There had been no loss of life and, aside from a few temporary scorch marks on the Center, no damage to the surrounding property. I, too, assumed it was a mostly inconsequential, likely an electrical accident, whose effects were exaggerated by the children at the scene. I was grateful that every life involved was spared. A death at the Center would've weighed heavily on my mind for some time. But when I encountered the results of the children's medical examinations, I wished that a death had occurred in the unfathomable-"

"For several weeks, the children were kept under observation at the Columbia-Presbyterian hospital. I visited them as soon as I had the chance to. All the families of the children were deeply unsettled, for they had all independently come to the conclusion that their children had been replaced by a doppleganger. They claimed that these new sons and daughters possessed substantial differences from their real children. The majority of differences involved altered physical attributes and the inability to recognize familiar locations and characters, such as their parents and their homes. Two boys even claimed to have names different to those of their mothers had given them at birth."

"But of all the discrepancies, the most bizzare was their faulty recollection of notable persons and events. For instance, each of the children claimed that I had become wealthiest man in America through an oil monopoly. It is common knowledge that I did indeed work at an oil refinery in my youth, but to entirely deny my two terms as president and insist instead that I had always been a mere philanthropist struck me as being particularly odd. The families were agonized by the children's behavior. Some continue to search for their 'real' children. I support their endeavors, for I do not believe the children's afflictions were the result of hysteria."

"Every day, I find myself recollecting the day I had selected the tree. I have since realized that the difficulties involved in the removal of it should have repeatedly discouraged me. And had I been discouraged, the families of those children would not be experiencing the anguish that they currently have. Perhaps I never had the oppertunity to select another tree. Perhaps I was meant to select the tree regardless of my persistent character. Perhaps we are all trollies, forced to follow the path of the track to each of our destinations. I take solace in that thought. Or perhaps the tree chose me."
-John Rockefeller

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