An 18-inch-tall sapling grown from the horse chestnut tree that often lifted Anne Frank’s spirits as she hid from the Nazis during World War II was recently delivered to Sonoma State University.
A special ceremony celebrating the sapling’s arrival will be held during the spring semester. In three years, the sapling will be planted at the foot of SSU’s Erna and Arthur Salm Holocaust and Genocide Memorial Grove, dedicated last year to honor survivors and victims of genocide committed throughout the world.
Until then, the sapling will be under guarantee to ensure it is healthy. The sapling will grow in a special shade house under lock and key for three years, supervised by Sam Youney, SSU’s director of landscaping, who is an expert in plant diseases and pest control. It will be protected so rain, rodents and insects cannot penetrate it.
The Rohnert Park campus was one of 11 U.S. institutions selected to receive a sapling taken from the aging tree that resides behind the annex where Anne Frank, her family and friends spent two years in hiding. The 150-year-old tree is battling a lethal fungus.
The remaining saplings are still in a Maryland facility awaiting processing. In fact, Sonoma State’s sapling arrived earlier than the one to be planted at the White House. The sites receiving saplings were selected by the New York–based Anne Frank Center USA as institutions dedicated to fighting injustice, intolerance and discrimination.
The Anne Frank sapling is not the first chestnut tree to grace the SSU campus. A mature specimen can reach a height of 80 feet and width of 75 feet.
For more information on the sapling or SSU’s memorial grove, see previous j. articles at www.jweekly.com/u/37568 and www.jweekly.com/u/40288.