Sapling will be planted at Southern Cayuga Central middle school in the next two years.
View full sizeThe splintered trunk of the monumental chestnut tree that comforted Anne Frank while she hid from the Nazis during World War II is seen after it fell over on Monday in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The tree's trunk snapped close to the ground and it toppled into neighboring gardens, damaging several sheds. No one was hurt. The 150-year-old tree suffered from fungus and moths that had caused more than half its trunk to rot. Two years ago the 27-ton tree was encased in a steel tripod as a precaution, but that failed under windy weather Monday.The chestnut tree that cheered Anne Frank while she was in hiding from the Nazis was toppled by wind and heavy rain Monday, but clones of the tree are doing well in the United States.
Many clones of the tree have been taken, including 11 to be planted at sites around the United States and 150 at a park in Amsterdam.
One of those saplings is waiting to be planted at the Southern Cayuga Central School District’s middle school sometime in the next two years. The middle school is about 15 miles south of Auburn in Poplar Ridge.
The 11 saplings currently are under quarantine. They must go through three leafing cycles to be certain they don’t carry certain plant diseases that may have infested the tree from which they were taken, said Southern Cayuga Central School Superintendent Mary Kay Worth. Worth said the district expects to receive the tree by 2012.
“The last thing that we heard was that everything was going OK,” Worth said about the sapling’s health. “We’re all very hopeful that we are going grow history here.”
Contact Sarah Moses at smoses@syracuse.com or 470-2298.
