Halle Peace Grove

In realizing a first step in the idea described above of a worldwide distribution of peace trees, the “Trees For Peace”, we started a project, the “Halle Peace Grove”.

After we found out through research that the Thomas Mann Forest mentioned above was actually a grove in which the 5 trees for Luckner had been planted in 1966, we also decided on the number 5 for the peace grove we were planning.

The city of Halle (Saale) was very supportive of the project from the start, so we quickly received written permission to complete our project on municipal land. The city’s parks department was more than willing to cooperate and was extremely helpful, among other things, in selecting the right trees for our latitude and the special challenges of the location we had chosen.

On November 25, 2024, the time had come. In the presence of Ms. Katharina Brederlow, Deputy Mayor for Education and Social Affairs of the City of Halle (Saale), Dirk Schlesier (Head of the Planetarium) and Dr. Markus Folgner (Chairman of the Planetarium’s Friends’ Association) – all three of whom were happy to pick up a spade and diligently helped with the planting – the three trees were planted. This, of course, was under the expert guidance of the city’s parks department and the Saale tree nursery, from which the trees for the “Halle Peace Grove” come. Numerous members of our society were also present, so that the action could be completed within a relatively manageable time frame. Nevertheless, it was new to some of us how many details have to be taken into account when planting a tree – at least if you want to do it professionally.

The tree species are the following, which we name from the left (when looking from the planetarium):

- Broad-leaved whitebeam

- Hop hornbeam carpinifolia

- Gleditsia triacanthos inermis (Gleditsia)

- Sweet chestnut

- Castanea sativa

- Zelkova serrata Green Vase (Japanese zelkova)

The trees were all financed by donations from members of the Luckner Society and without the use of public subsidies. We thank everyone involved for their support!

Below we have attached a few impressions of the tree planting.

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