Sweet Auburn: The Magazine of the Friends of Mount Auburn Mount Auburn as a Community Resource | Page 7

We bought four spaces there because we’re all going to
be there at some point, in the same place.
I’ve been to a lot of funerals, of family and friends, and
I’ve been to some pretty fancy cemeteries in other parts of
the country, and I think Mount Auburn’s level of profes-
sionalism and compassion is extraordinary—and rare. My
sense is that this work there is a kind of vocation. Everything
the staff did that touched us was done with a level of
compassion and caring.
We had a memorial service last year at Nick’s grave on
the first anniversary of his death. We also come to the Service
of Commemoration the Cemetery holds during the holidays;
that’s been very comforting as well.
Laura L. Nash, Ph.D., Horticulturist and educator
Chair of Horticulture Committee,
Cambridge Plant and Garden Club
Laura Nash is the Chair of the Linden Tree Project of the Cam-
bridge Plant and Garden Club and is a member of the Board of
The Friends of Longfellow House in Cambridge. She has been
Chair of the Board’s Garden Committee for Longfellow House
for the past five years. She was formerly a Senior Lecturer at the
Harvard Business School, semi-retired two years ago, and is cur-
rently a lecturer and author on business ethics. Laura lives with her
husband Thomas Beale in Cambridge.
e are so excited to collaborate with Mount Auburn
on our four-year project for the centennial of the
Garden Club of America. Every G.C.A. club will be study-
ing, documenting and propagating a significant tree in their
town, with a view to horticultural education and public
service. The Cambridge Garden Club chose the enormous
American linden (Tilia americana) on the grounds of the
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow house on Brattle Street, and
the National Park Service was generous enough to allow
us to clone it under close supervision. This tree predates
Longfellow and may go back to the time when George
Washington used the house as his headquarters during the
Revolutionary War. The club’s “One Hundred Longfellow
Lindens” project seeks to clone one hundred of these trees
to donate to public spaces in Cambridge and around the
United States.
Lindens, called lime trees in England, have heart-shaped
leaves and wonderful blossoms that are made into tea. You
will find various cultivars placed in long alleys or among
the tallest specimens on historic properties. In Europe, they
have an iconography associated with love and the cause of
peace. Since Longfellow was a supporter of trees, pacifism
and progressive politics, we felt this was a great match, bo-
tanically and culturally.
This particular tree has a rich place in the Cambridge
landscape. The Longfellow House grounds are a major
jewel in “the green necklace” that runs along Brattle Street
from Radcliffe Yard to Mount Auburn Cemetery. Cambridge
Plant and Garden Club members have donated time and
money to many locations in this necklace over the years,
so we saw a geographical and personal link.
Why did we turn to Mount Auburn for help? After all,
we have lots of experience in the Garden Club and have
sponsored many public plantings in Cambridge. Well, we
felt we had to go there. Mount Auburn has amazing plantings
and beautiful, mature trees you won’t see anywhere else.
There was a horticultural and historical connection to our
goals and to Longfellow, whose birthday is celebrated
annually at his grave in Mount Auburn Cemetery.
The Club first turned to [Mount Auburn President]
Dave Barnett for advice about propagating the tree; he’d
already served as an advisor to the Friends of Longfellow
House Gardening and Grounds Committee and spoken at
the Garden Club about the conservation practices and new
plantings. Dennis Collins, Mount Auburn’s Horticultural
Curator, found space for the cloned specimens in Mount
Auburn’s greenhouses and helped us with the first batch
of cuttings this summer.
People we’ve spoken to from around the country have
been very enthusiastic about having “a Longfellow linden”
in a public space. We have archives, artwork, historic houses,
and furniture, but a tree, this tree, this tree is a living connection
to the past, a piece of history.
W
L-R, Horticultural Curator Dennis Collins with Laura Nash and
Sibyl Martin (right) of the Cambridge Plant and Garden Club at
Mount Auburn’s greenhouses.
Fall 2009 | 5