Newton Girl Brings Piece of Anne Frank's Tree to Boston

When Anne Frank was a young teenager, her family went into hiding in a "secret annex" in Amsterdam as Nazis swept through Europe during World War II.

Frank chonicled her time in hiding in her diary, now a famous book titled "The Diary of a Young Girl." In her diary, Frank described looking out at a chestnut tree that she could glimpse through a high window in the attic of the annex.

"Our chestnut tree is in full bloom," Frank wrote in an entry dated May 13, 1944. "It's even more beautiful than last year."

Now, an offspring of that very chestnut tree will have a chance to bloom in Boston thanks to 15-year-old Newton resident Aliyah Finkel.

Finkel first felt connected to Frank when she visited the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam five years ago, according to WBUR.

When it came time to celebrate her Bat Mitzvah, Finkel asked her parents to return to Amsterdam and honor Frank's memory. While planning for the trip, WBUR reports, Finkel learned the famed chestnut tree had become diseased and fallen three years ago.

But, Finkel learned, chestnuts from the tree had been saved and 10 of the resulting saplings were marked for the U.S.

“When I was 12 and I was looking for a Bat Mitzvah project,” she told WBUR, “I heard about the saplings and I sent a proposal to the mayor and he approved it.”

On Tuesday, dignitaries from Boston and Europe attended a dedication on Boston Common of the sapling.

According to Beacon Hill Patch, Boston and 10 other communities were awarded saplings by The Anne Frank Center USA from the horse chestnut tree that stood outside the Secret Annex in Amsterdam where Frank and her family hid from the Nazis for two years.

The tree toppled over in a 2010 wind storm, and 34 organizations submitted proposals to receive one of the saplings from the tree.

During a ceremony Tuesday, the tiny sapliing was planted on the Mayor’s Walk between the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial and the Earl of Sandwich Café.

Finkel told WBUR she wants the tree to be a symbol of hope for Boston just as it was a symbol of hope for Frank 70 years ago.