Historic Washington Cherry Tree Uprooted by Storm

Last Friday’s storm knocked out power to 700 Clinton residents and cut off Comcast internet service to village residents for five days (the internet outage also prevented this paper from being published). In addition to the loads of damage around the Manchester area, the storm also claimed an historic victim: a cherry tree planted to honor our first president.

In 1989, on April 30th at 4pm, “George Washington” came to the village of Manchester. The re-enactor came to deliver Washington’s first inaugural address from the Gazebo in Wurster Park on the 200th Anniversary of the first delivery of that speech. This event was the culmination of 5 years of activities in which the village participated as part of the nationwide celebration of the bicentennial of the Constitution. That Sunday, arborists from Underwood Nursery in Adrian donated an ornamental cherry tree and helped plant it. They were assisted by Historical Society Members Tom Walton, Howard Parr, and Janet Shurtliff, as well as Mayor Mary Kallewaard and Village Council Member Wendell Reinhardt.

The retired Governor John B. Swainson, then a major force in the village, presided at the event. After “Washington” delivered his address, MHS Social Studies teacher John Korican rendered the 18th Century language into modern speech so that everyone could better understand it. At the foot of the tree was placed a concrete marker.

After the speech and the tree planting, celebrants retired to the Emanuel Church Hall where homemade cherry pie was served. It was on that same day that the Historical Marker in front of the church was also unveiled.

Now, more than 20 years later, the tree is gone.

An inspection of the fallen tree revealed, plainly, that it never set down deep roots. The tree was disposed of by Village workers late last week.

According to a 1989 ENTERPRISE article, the tree was apparently Canadian.

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by Fritz Swanson

Fritz Swanson has written for The Believer, the Christian Science Monitor, Print Magazine, McSweeney's, Esopus, LSA Magazine, and The Mid-American Review. He serves as a trustee on the Manchester District Library Board. He's the designer and publisher of The Manchester Mirror.

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