Historical Name: World Trade Center Survivor
Common Name: Pear
Latin Name: Pyrus calleryana
In October 2001, one month after the 9-11 attack on the World Trade Center in New York City, workers cleaning up the Ground Zero site made a remarkable discovery. Buried beneath the debris were the remains of a Callery Pear tree. The tree had been growing near Buildings 4 and 5 near Church Street since the 1970’s as part of the landscaping around the World Trade Center. The remains of the tree consisted of little more than an 8-foot section of the trunk, some roots, and a branch.
Noting that the charred remains of the tree seemed to have some life left in it, the workers carefully removed the tree from the wreckage and transported it to the Parks Department’s Citywide Plant Nursery in the Bronx’s Van Cortland Park. There, under the care of Director Richard Cabo and his colleagues, the tree thrived and grew. In December 2010, the then 30-foot tall tree returned to lower Manhattan and was planted in a prominent location at the National September 11 Memorial.
The World Trade Center Survivor Pear tree in UCNJ’s Historic Tree Grove is a direct seed grown offspring of the original tree, although technically the seeds were not collected from the specimen growing at the World Trade Center. Not long after the original tree was recovered and brought to the Bronx nursery, Mr. Cabo took some cuttings of the tree, to preserve its lineage if the tree itself did not survive. A few cuttings (clones of the original) were propagated successfully and now grow in the nursery. In October 2015, Dr. T. Ombrello obtained some seeds collected from these trees by Mr. Cabo. They were then germinated and grown at UCNJ. One was transplanted into the Historic Tree Grove in 2019. While a bit of a convoluted story, that tree is truly an offspring of the World Trade Center Survivor Pear in Manhattan since it was grown from that tree’s clone.
The original Survivor Pear, under the watchful eyes of its caretakers at the National September 11 Memorial, should continue its amazing life for many years to come as a symbol of resiliency. UCNJ’s offspring tree will continue that legacy too.