Entertainment

Featured Slideshows

World's Most Useless Facts

E-mail

Close Window E-mail This Page

Anne Frank's Tree To Bloom In Boston Common

Required fields are marked with an asterisk(*)

Recipient E-mail:*
- Your Name:*
- Your E-mail:*
Add a Message:
Send me a copy of this e-mail.

Type the characters in this picture:*

Click here to refresh with new letters

The information you provide will be used only to send the requested e-mail and will not be used to send any other e-mail communications. Read more in our Privacy Policy

Send E-mail

Print Share + Comments

Oct 17, 2009 1:53 pm US/Eastern

Anne Frank's Tree To Bloom In Boston Common

BOSTON (CBS) ―

Click to enlarge 1 of 2: The chestnut tree in the backyard of the house in Amsterdam where Anne Frank and her family were hiding during World War II, is pictured 16 November 2007. It's battling a lethal fungus. Saplings will be sent to 11 sites, including the Boston Common.
EVERT ELZINGA/AFP/Getty Images
Click to enlarge 2 of 2: Anne Frank
AP

Close

numSlides of totalImages

Anne Frank wrote in her diary about a majestic horse chestnut tree that filled her with happiness, as she was hiding from the Nazis in Amsterdam. A sapling from the 150-year-old tree will be planted in the Boston Common.

Anne could see the tree from the apartment where she, her family and their friends hid for two years. Most days, it was the only sign of nature she saw.

"From my favorite spot on the floor I look up at the blue sky and the bare chestnut tree, on whose branches little raindrops shine, appearing like silver," she wrote in a diary entry dated February 23, 1944.

Read: Excerpts From Anne Frank's Diary
The tree was attacked by an aggressive fungus, and a moth has been eating away the leaves. In November 2007, the tree had deteriorated so much, it was determined that it was no longer safe to leave it standing.

Saplings were taken from the tree. Organizations had the opportunity to request that a sapling be sent for planting at their location.

The 11 sites for the saplings were chosen by the Anne Frank Center USA, because they showed "the consequences of intolerance — and that includes racism, discrimination and hatred."

Sites Chosen For The Chesnut Tree Saplings
An 11-year-old girl researching what project she might undertake for her bat mitzvah asked Mayor Tom Menino to ask for the sapling. He did, and now the tree will be planted in the Boston Common, which has several monuments to liberty, and is the starting point for the Freedom Trail.

Other sites chosen include the White House, the World Trade Center site in New York and the Children's Museum of Indianapoils.