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The 76-foot-tall Norway spruce that was set up early Thursday morning in New York City’s silver jewelry Rockefeller Center has hometown roots.

The towering tree, which will be the centerpiece for the midtown Manhattan landmark’s Christmas festivities, was cut down Wednesday on the North Park Avenue property of Maria Corti.

About 160 neighbors, relatives and the curious turned out for the operation, joined by dozens of staffers from Rockefeller Center, who were handing out green sweatshirts, red scarves and breakfast treats. The activity turned usually placid North Park Avenue into a beehive of activity, with about 60 cars parked on the street and police officers directing traffic.

“I called Rockefeller Center last spring, thinking that I had a possible tree for Christmas,” Corti said, adding that she moved into the ranch home only about a year ago. “They suggested that I send in a picture of the tree with someone in the picture for proportion. So, that’s what I did.”

“I thought: ‘That would be the end of that,’ so to speak, because I’m sure a lot of people silver earrings write in thinking that they have a tree worthy enough for Rockefeller Center.”

Corti, a fifth-grade teacher at Cider Mill School in Wilton, said that within a few days she was contacted by David Murbach, Rockefeller Center’s gardens manager.

“Actually, it is a tough job,” Murbach said when asked how he goes about finding the perfect tree. “It’s one in a million. You think that there are

a lot of good trees around, but they’re not perfect like the ones that we need. We look for perfection.”

Murbach said that he goes aloft in a helicopter to find trees. From the chopper, Murbach said that he spotted the Corti spruce from miles away.

“I was hoping that it was someone else’s tree, because then I’d have one for next year,” he said.

About 10 a.m. Wednesday, the lumberjacks’ buzz saws fell silent and the tree was lifted silver key rings off its stump and lashed onto a 115-foot tractor-trailer flatbed for the trip to New York City.

A flock of grade school children immediately descended on the stump to count the rings.

“Forty-three!” confidently announced Kate McKinnon, an 11-year-old student at West Rock Middle School in Norwalk. “I counted twice.” She was with her 6-year-old sister, Claire, and both said that they would be sure to see the tree after it’s decorated.

The next step is to decorate it with 30,000 lights. The tree-lighting ceremony will take place at 7 p.m. Dec. 2, and it will be broadcast live on WNBC-TV, Channel 4.

The tree is the second from the region in two years to be chosen. In 2007, a Norway spruce from Shelton got the distinction.

Tree timeline Historical milestones for Rockefeller Center tree: 1931: Workmen on a muddy silver necklaces construction site put up the first Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree. At the time of the Depression, the workmen placed the tree in the middle of a construction site. 1933: First formal Rockefeller Center tree-lighting ceremony takes place. Tree is decked with 700 lights in front of the 8-month-old RCA Building. 1936: Two trees, each 70 feet tall, were erected. For the first time, the lighting ceremony included a skating pageant on the newly opened Rockefeller Plaza outdoor ice skating rink. 1942: Three trees were placed on Rockefeller Plaza, one decorated in red, one in white and the other in blue to show support for troops in World War II. 1949: Tree was painted silver to look like snow. 1951: The center’s tree lighted for the first time on national television on the Kate Smith Show. 1966: The first tree from outside the United States was erected. It was given by Canada, in honor of the centennial of its confederation. 1980: For 50th anniversary of tree lighting, a 70-foot-tall Norway spruce came from the grounds of the Immaculate Conception Seminary of Mahwah, N.J. Bob Hope participated in the lighting. 1999: The largest tree in Rockefeller Center history, 100 feet high, from Killingworth, Conn. 2007: For the first time, the tree is lit with 30,000 energy-efficient LEDs. Hundreds of solar panels atop one of the Rockefeller Center buildings help power the new LEDs.