Going green: Community gathers for annual Rotary tree planting
SHEPHERDSTOWN — After a rain delay from the previous weekend, members of the Shepherdstown Rotary Club were joined by other volunteers to plant trees at Elmwood Cemetery and Morgan’s Grove Park on Saturday. A large group gathered to make quick work of planting eight trees in each location.
The tree planting project was a joint effort between the Rotary Club of Shepherdstown, Elmwood Cemetery, the Shepherdstown Community Club and the Cacapon Institute, a nonprofit watershed-protection organization headquartered in Morgan County.
The Cacapon Institute donated the trees, and a project manager from the organization, Zach Norris, was on-hand to instruct volunteers on tree-planting techniques. The eight trees included four red oak and four red maple at the cemetery and four hackberry and four red oak at the park.
The donation of the trees came through the Cacapon Institute’s Carla Hardy West Virginia Communi-Tree Program, which promotes tree planting on urban and suburban lands. The main goal of the program is to help protect the area’s water resources by reducing stormwater runoff pollution.
According to Rotarian Peter Smith, additional goals include increasing awareness of local water quality issues, educating the public about the benefits of tree, promoting long-term tree maintenance and encouraging volunteerism.
In addition, the planting of the trees helps to beautify the cemetery and the park.
Smith provided some interesting history of the two locations where trees were placed this year. Elmwood Cemetery, he said, was chartered in 1869 and incorporates two older church cemeteries that date back to the 18th century. Many members of the town’s oldest families are buried there, Smith said.
Morgan’s Grove Park sits on land that was near the spot that local militia began their famous 600-mile “Beeline March” on July 16, 1775, to join General George Washington’s troops in Massachusetts. In addition, the property served as the site of an annual Morgan’s Grove Fair, from 1889 to 1936. It has been operated as a public park by the Shepherdstown Community Club since 1961.
The Rotary Club of Shepherdstown has hosted the tree planting events for several years, in an effort to ensure that new trees replace those that have died in both locations.