In our last installment of “Collections Highlights,” we left readers hanging off the edges of the seats wondering what the connection would be with Mai Rogers Coe and her beech trees While she was born in New York, she enjoyed her childhood summers with family in Fairhaven, MA. As the wife of William Robertson Coe, she desired to have two beech trees relocated to Planting Fields from Fairhaven. After being dug from the soil, the trees measured sixty feet tall with a spread of forty feet. They traveled the longest distance of which there had been any record, 300 miles across the Long Island Sound plus several more miles on land. Mr. Coe contracted the Moon Company to make the trip, who charged $3500. The trees were placed on the barge, ready to set sail in early February 1915, and, after a fog delay and a two and a half day journey across the sound, they arrived in Oyster Bay Harbor. However, they were not placed in the soil at Planting Fields until early March. They were transported through the streets of Oyster Bay over the period of twelve working days. Mr. Coe paid Nassau Light and Power Company $1000 to take down and replace the wires in the neighborhood streets. One beech did not survive the original trip. Since then, the community has embraced the Fairhaven beech. Children laughed and played under it, couples strolled under its shade, visitors sat and read books beneath its branches. Unfortunately, the second beech tree has died, and was taken down in February 2006. However, the “Fairhaven Beech” will live on! Seedlings have been collected from the tree from 2000-2005. The beech is a purple beech, a type of copper beech. Because of genetics, only 10-20% of the seedlings that germinate from the mother tree are actually purple. The rest are green. That is because it is a man made cultivated variety rather then a naturally occurring variety. We have about 100 seedlings in the nursery that are purple. Join us on April 22nd and 23rd, 2006 for the Annual Arbor Festival. We will have family activities, nature crafts, music, and more. We will also have our Barn Sale; this year it will be held in the Visitor Center entrance of Coe Hall. There, you will also find an opportunity to say farewell to the Fairhaven Beech yourself. The fee for the festival is $5 for adults and $1 for children ages 2-12