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Message: <br /><br /> If you are having trouble reading this email, you may view this article online at: http://www.jweekly.com/59018/full/59018/so-long-to-the-anne-frank-tree/ <br /><br /> <b>So long to the Anne Frank tree</b> <br /> Monday, August 23, 2010 | by rachel leibold <br /><br /><p> <div class="default" style="width: 180px;"><img align="left" alt="anne_frank_tree_240" height="240" hspace="8" src="http://www.jweekly.com/images/uploads/blog_art/0810/anne_frank_tree_240.jpg" title="anne_frank_tree_240" vspace="8" width="180" /> <div class="caption">The dying Anne Frank Tree. (photo by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/33005380@N00/" target="_blank">huliana90212</a>)<br /></div> </div> AP <a href="http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iMAIzAYkqvu6a71d43Gcr80IUyxQD9HP7T780" target="_blank">is reporting</a> that the 150-year-old chestnut tree that gave comfort to Anne Frank during her family's time in the Annex fell during a bad storm in Amsterdam earlier today.</p> <p>You may recall that the tree was deemed a safety hazard in 2007 and ordered cut down (it suffered from fungus and moths and was mostly rotten), but global outcry and a court battle led to its reprieve. A steel support system was installed to prevent it from falling, but Mother Nature had other plans.</p> <p>Thankfully, many saplings have been taken from the tree that will allow it to live on for the forseeable future. One of them will soon reside in the Bay Area, in the Holocaust Memorial Grove at Sonoma State University in Rohnert Park. The sapling arrived in January, but has to be quarantined for two years before planting to make sure it doesn't carry certain plant diseases.</p> <p>According to AP, it's not known whether a new tree will be planted on the spot, since the chestnut tree was actually on the grounds of a neighboring yard.</p> <p>Here's what Anne Frank wrote about the tree in her diary...no matter how many times I've read it, it always gives me chills:</p> <p style="padding-left: 30px;"><em>“Nearly every morning I go to the attic to blow the stuffy air out of my lungs. 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, and at the seagulls and other birds as they glide on the wind. As long as this exists, I thought, and I may live to see it, this sunshine, the cloudless skies, while this lasts I cannot be unhappy.”</em></p>

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