A busy holiday weekend is in store in Historic Yorktown on Dec. 3-5, beginning with the Christmas Tree Lighting on Friday, Dec. 3 at the Victory Monument and Yorktown Waterfront.

Monument festivities begin at 6:30 p.m., with the tree lighting at 7:30. This community tradition goes all the way back to 1945. That’s the year the Rev. Claud G. Barkley, pastor of Yorktown Baptist Church, and staff from the County Clerk’s office decorated a cedar tree that stood at the corner of Main and Ballard streets.

The York County Historical Committee keeps this ritual going. The tree that is used today is a 20-foot artificial commercial “Giant Everest Fir” tree placed down in Riverwalk Landing.

Everyone is invited to gather at the Yorktown Victory Monument for live music, including a performance by the Fifes and Drums of York Town. From there, the procession will make its way from the Victory Monument to Riverwalk Landing, where the tree-lighting ceremony will begin. Parents and grandparents...