Adventure: 051, Site 074 –
Moon Tree
Team: Thing One, Thing Two
Date: September 26, 2012
Location:
Latitude:
N 38° 34.619
Longitude:
W 121° 29.578
Address: Capitol Mall, Sacramento, CA
Sometimes you come across an adventure
which is out of this world. This is one of them. This tree, or should
we say its seed, has been to the moon and back. Last week, we were
watching an episode of California Gold with Huell Howser's and it
started in a forest lab up in the Sierra's. It then went on to talk
about a man named Stuart Roosa had been a smoke jumper for the Forest
Service. He went on to have another career, an out of this world job
which took him to the moon. While Alan Shepard and Edgar Mitchell
spent some time on the moon, Roosa stayed up in command capsule. As
part of the personal effects Roosa took with him, there was hundreds
of tree seeds, some were redwoods. Each state was given some of the
seeds to plant during the Bi-centennial celebrations.
So 51 years after being in space, we
have a young redwood growing close to the K St entrance to the
Capitol Building. Is this historic or what? Not a lot of things are
alive after going around the moon.
Now our story is that we had seen the
California Gold episode and since we were on the Capitol Mall, we
decided to find this tree. We walked around the three of the sides of
the Capitol Building, finally getting to the K St entrance. Thing One
thought maybe he tree was in a small grove. But we came across a
grounds-keeper and asked. We were only 30' away from the tree—helpful
person the grounds-keeper is. We later went inside the Capitol and
was talking to a docent, who mentioned a special treat—the moon
tree. He said that last week, there were many people who were looking
for the moon tree, because of the space shuttle flyover.
Other California locations for Moon
Trees are: Arcata—CSU Humbolt, Berkeley, El Dorado Hills,
Lockeford, Monterey, San Diego, and San Luis Obispo.
References:
- Wikipedia
- NASA
Site
- Where
Have All the Moon Trees Gone – story in
Wired
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