Moon Trees Locationless, Locationless, Locationless
By phat.bak on 27-Aug-02. Waypoint GC85D0

This moon tree is located in a park just outside of Atchison, KS.

Moon Tree at North Pembroke Historical Society
North Pembroke, Massachusetts

When we first learned of this locationless cache for Moon Trees, Mr. Seeker was immediately intrigued and hopeful that we could log one of these. However, as we started to research the locations of the existing Moon Trees, we soon discovered that all of the living Moon Trees in New England had already been logged, except for the moon tree planted in North Pembroke. Alas, many sources indicated that the tree which had been given to the North Pembroke Historical Society died shortly after planting. We decided to track down as much as we could about the North Pembroke Moon Tree and visit the site where it had been planted (even if it was no longer there) to clear up as much of the mystery as possible.

Today we finally visited the North Pembroke Historical Society. We learned from Everett Reed that the moon tree had been planted on the small green "common" in front of the Historical Society Building. (For more info, [url=http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/moon_trees/holliston_tree.html]see this article on the Holliston, MA moon tree[/url].) The Pembroke moon tree did die shortly after planting, and was removed. There is now a tree in that spot, although we are certain that it is not a Moon Tree. In any case, we had great fun learning more about the moon trees, and visiting the North Pembroke Historical Socity to be able to log a find for one of the "now extinct" moon trees. Thanks for the unique locationless cache.

1026. MajorT, DocDesi and I found this while caching a while back. I'd not gotten a chance to log it (with the owners permission of course). The tree was 'dead' in the snow so we took pictures with the sign saying what the tree was. TFTC!

What a fun day caching with Major T and Odragon....This was just one of our many stops....thanks for the history lesson and thanks for letting us log the cache...see Odragon's log for the pictures

I was surprised no one got this one yet, but then, I had a little inside information. I was there in 1976 when they planted this tree. We students all gathered around for the groundbreaking ceremony that day. The sad thing is, this tree is not well marked, and very few people at the school remember its significance. I hope it doesn’t get chopped down. The plaque in the main entry hall reads:

{The sycamore tree located in the courtyard of Booker Elementary School was planted there by students from the school on Arbor Day, April 30, 1976. It looks like an ordinary sycamore tree, but it is indeed special, for it was one of several tree seeds in a small vial which accompanied Astronaut Stuart Roosa to the moon during the Apollo 14 Space Mission. The seeds were later given to the U.S. Forestry Service for planting and limited distribution throughout the country.

Hampton’s elementary schools participated in a poetry/prose contest on the ecological, versatile, and aesthetic benefits of trees, to determine which school would be awarded the tree. Marjorie White, a 6th grade student of Booker Elementary School in 1976, submitted the winning poem, thus giving Booker School the honor of planting the “moon tree.â€}

If you get a chance to stop by and see it, ask to read Marjorie's poem, which hangs in the office. She did a great job!

There are 3 moon redwoods on the Humboldt State University campus in Arcata, CA. I've been hoping to log them for a few months, but couldn't find out exactly which ones they were. The only info I could find was an article from 1999 in the campus newspaper, The LumberJack, (online at http://web.archive.org/web/20040214030143/http://www.thejack.org/fall99/09-15-99/campus/campus_moontrees.html ). It says 'Now a group of six trees stands clustered on the side of the theatre arts building; the three in the middle are the Moon Trees'. But I couldn't tell which ones are 'in the middle'. The article also says 'There were signs set in cement marking exactly which ones were the moon trees, but three times they were stolen, so eventually they stopped marking them'.

Recently I met another cacher, Hidegoseek, as we were both looking for a new cache nearby. I mentioned my question, and he said he might know someone who could answer it. He talked to Alistair McCrone (former HSU president), who directed him to Wayne Hawkins (supervisor of grounds and landscape services), who described the positions of the moon trees: they're the ones in back, closest to the building.

Hidegoseek gets much of the credit for this, so I suggested to him that we should both log it, but he declined.

I was really suprised to find a "moom tree" so close to home. This tree is located in Atchison Kansas at Warnock Lake. The area would be a great place to study trees'. We went with the son & his family.
thanks

We were doing Staurts Hitchhike in Core Creek Park in Bucks County Pennsylvania today. When we read the Virtual Cache we realized what this was. Its a Moon Tree brought back from the Moon. This Sycamore Tree has survived over 30 years of blight which has destroyed most of the sycamores in the area. Thanks

I learned of the second generation Moon Tree at Tampa Florida's Museum of Science and Industry through the link on this cache page. Getting to the museum was easy, finding the tree was nearly impossible. There are only 3 sycamores on the grounds (that I could find), but none of them were identified. When I saw the place where a plaque had been near one of them, I was fairly certain I had found the tree, but I did want someone to verify. It took a number of phone calls from the members desk (okay, I'm not a member, but nobody asked) to finally find a garden volunteer who verified that the plaque from the tree was stolen, but the tree is in fact the moon tree.

SECOND GENERATION
Was waiting for my trip to Sewanee this week to grab the one there but someone stole my thunder on getting a 1st generation Moon Tree. Instead, I had to settle for the next best thing, the Second Generation Moon Tree planted in honor of the man who brought us the Moon Trees: Stuart A. Roosa. It was planted 09feb05 which was the 34th anniversary of the Apollo 14 mission. There is no actual marker at the tree but thankfully the following weblink led me to the exact spot as well as more information on this tree and the ceremony. http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/moon_trees/arlington_tree.html
The tree has grown a bit since it's planting.
Flyingmoose

This Loblolly Pine, planted on Arbor Day 03/15/76, stands at the courthouse in Ft. Smith, Arkansas.

[This entry was edited by Golfnutz on Tuesday, September 06, 2005 at 6:57:39 PM.]

KD4ADC, 2:00pm #1275. This first generation sycamore moon tree is located on the campus of the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. Their website says that it is located south of the Woods Laboratories building, but there are many trees in that area, none with placards. After asking a staff member who directed me to the Forestry building, I found a faculty member who, in conjunction with student, verified the exact location. I have included the picture of the tree with my GPS, another of just the tree, and one showing the circular stone wall around the base of the tree. This is my 100th locationless cache log (the numbers don’t match due to some locationless caches on the site being categorized as virtuals). Many times, there is more work involved in a good locationless than a traditional. Thanks for the fun cache!

Lincoln State Park - Lincoln City, Indiana http://www.in.gov/dnr/parklake/properties/park_lincoln.html

This was very interesting! I enjoyed the story about the moon trees so much that I passed it on to several family members.

We also very much enjoyed our visit to the nearby Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial http://www.nps.gov/libo/ just across the highway from Lincoln State Park (where this moon tree is located). The Lincoln Boyhood Memorial is well worth a visit; especially enlightening is the historic "Trail of Twelve Stones."

Thanks for a nice experience!

macdonr and I found this Moon Tree together; I am logging this one and he is logging another one we found the day before. This loblolly pine is located at Doyle Conner Building in Tallahassee, Florida, USA. The building houses offices of the Florida Department of Agriculture. The tree is marked by a plaque indicating the tree was planted in 1976.

macdonr and I searched Cascades Park in Tallahassee, Florida, USA for the Moon Tree reported to be there. A rather thorough search of the park grounds with two friends turned up two sycamores in the southwest corner of the park. They are not marked in any way, so we were unable with the resources at hand ~ including lengthy web searches ~ to confirm whether one or both are Moon Trees (or one Moon Tree and one second generation tree). We are posting this waypoint and picture in hopes that it will help someone else in their search.