Grant Tree

The question of monuments was being much discussed in Chicago in 2020, with a commission contemplating removing or annotating many of the iconic works that are part of a Chicagoan’s mental map. Included on the list is the statue of Grant on horseback in Lincoln Park. Not on the list for the monuments commission is a monument to Grant that’s barely on anyone’s mental map—a small boulder with a carved message in the middle of the grass in Washington Park. It says "Tree Planted by Ulysses S. Grant December Sixth, 1879." There's no tree nearby, let alone one planted by Grant. 

It's located just south of 51st St. on Cottage Grove. Follow Payne Drive west. When you reach the armory turn right and follow a curving driveway into a parking lot. The boulder is north and slightly east of the parking lot.

Photo of a Boulder with a hard to read carving sitting near a parking lot. Photo by George Rumsey

So the search for answers took me through the shaky foundations of history, memory, and meaning--with a larger question that's been bothering me for a while, What do monuments do?

I suspect that for at least 80 years one approach has been to deny them power through general snark about the pompous past. Certainly that was Atlas Obscura’s answer to the meaning of the boulder—they created a story about Grant tossing some seeds in the ground to plant an oak (They could at least have gone for verisimilitude and had him toss acorns). I was suspicious that wasn't the answer to the boulder's question. A couple of seeds rarely turn into trees worthy of boulders. 

The first answer I hit in the Chicago Tribune was a very long article from 1899 interviewing a long-time fan of the tree. The article starts out, “Guarding the northeastern entrance to Washington Park stands a giant elm. Everybody admires it and a few regard it with sentiments of genuine affection. Its friends call it Grant’s elm. Few of the trees among the thousands in Chicago have more reason to rear themselves in proud solitude and to lord it over lesser growths. Old-timers in Chicago remember well the great Sanitary Fair in Dearborn Park in the spring of 1865. But best of all they remember the acclaim with which the victorious Generals Grant and Sherman were received at that fair and at the public reception in the old Crosby Opera House. But comparatively few recall the ceremonies which were carried out at that time in the pretty village of Hyde Park.” 

Photo of the lone elm tree without a boulder. The caption says it was planted in 1865. From the Chicago Tribune of 1899

I suspect few remember because it didn’t happen, not in 1865 anyway. There wasn't even a park in 1865. But Ephraim H. Cummings remembered. He’d been living in Chicago since 1837 and he told the journalist that his great concern was for the survival of the elm—because non-native trees don’t survive long in the Hyde Park sand. He remembered that it was his suggestion that the Grant elm be given a chance at survival by digging a basin in the clay that's under the sand, filling the basin with gravel and black earth. The article focuses on Cummings' conviction that trees need companions in order to be healthy and his argument that the elm needed companion trees. Now that scientists have researched how tree root systems communicate with each other through mycorrhiza, it's clear that's one thing Cummings got right.  

It seems fairly obvious in this 1899 account that there was no boulder monument to correct the great details that Cummings added to the story that didn’t happen. There's no sign of a boulder in the photo with the article. Perhaps this article triggered a movement to plant the boulder there. All I could find is that the boulder appeared "some years" after the tree was planted. 

By 1912, the boulder had been there a number of years. There’s a letter in the Tribune complaining that the boulder is wrong. The boulder at that time said that the tree had been planted in November 1879. Instead, it had clearly been planted in December and he'd found an article in the Tribune to prove it.

I can see why they got the date wrong if someone remembered the year. That fall of 1879, Grant was making a procession across the states, saying farewell to public life. The veterans of the Grand Army of the Republic and even the Mexican-American War were pouring into the cities by the thousands to say a passionate farewell to their leader. It would have made sense to have a ceremony then. The Tribune details event after event--parades, assemblies, speeches, banquets--that went on for days in November. But no tree. 

Instead, in December, the tour over, Grant returned to Chicago to spend time with his son, who lived in Chicago with his wife--the sister of Bertha Honoré Palmer. Grant's in-laws had one more event for him and 150 dignitaries, who gathered at the Palmer House to drive down to the park on the boulevards in their carriages and plant a tree. Several hundred locals gathered to watch as speeches were made. Grant said “I hope that in my future visits to your magnificent park I may see the tree which I am now about to plant growing and flourishing, and that in its growth it may be symbolical of the growth and prosperity of your magnificent city.” And with that, he threw a few shovelfuls of dirt into the hole with a nickel-plated shovel (not gold plated as Cummings remembered). Several of the others took the shovel and added their bit. The elm, which was held at a 30 degree angle by a windlass, was winched into its hole (which may or may not have had Cummings extra rich earth). The Tribune reporter of 1879 made a point of saying that the crowd was disappointed that lunch was not provided, being clearly disappointed himself.

Some time after 1912, the boulder and tree were worth a postcard, so it must have had some visitors. The flagpole is a nice touch.

 

Painted postcard of the elm, the boulder, and an American flag on a flagpole in the park, with the correct inscription, so it dates from after 1912. From Firmly Planted — U.S. Grant Cottage National Historic Landmark

Several accounts suggest the tree died in the 1930s, though without a date or details. Cummings was right to worry that it was lonely in its nutrient-poor sandy soil, however, it would have succumbed anyway in the 1970s when Dutch elm disease swept through the South Parks.

The Park District took the tree and left the boulder. In 1960, a person who stumbled across it, wrote to the Tribune, wondering what the story was. The Tribune didn’t bother to find out but ran this cartoon. 

Editorial cartoon of a man in a suit wondering, "Was it Washington in Grant Park?" next to the boulder. from the Chicago Tribune

The Park District decided to plant a Kentucky Coffee Tree there after the reporter asked about the boulder. But the Coffee Tree didn’t want to live in the lonely, nutrient-poor sand of Hyde Park either. 

So, it does show what some monuments are good for--people ask questions, though not too often. In 2014, someone asked Geoffrey Baer, the font of all things Chicago, about it. He too found the account in the December 7, 1879, edition of the Chicago Tribune and focused on its lament over the missing lunch. Ask Geoffrey: 7/9 | Chicago News | WTTW 

But for me, the monument taught me something new about Grant. I'd kept wondering, why a tree, especially when it became clear that he planted quite a few trees, even one that still lives in Japan. The hard-driving military tactician who drank too much and smoked too many cigars. Why would even his in-laws think he wanted to plant a tree?

I’ve read Grant's stirring well-written memoir. I knew his reputation in the Civil War and in his administration--though obviously not enough. And I knew that he’d launched crushing colonization of indigenous lands through things like the Homestead Act and military action in the West. That's why the survival of his statue in Lincoln Park is a focus of the monuments commission. 

But what I hadn’t known until I tried to find out about this missing tree was his faith in the power and beauty of trees to be the lungs of the earth and an inspiration. He’d created Yellowstone as the world's first national park. He helped launch the unofficial holiday of Arbor Day, which encourages everyone to plant trees. He created legislation to encourage the homesteaders on the plains to plant windbreaks of trees to conserve the land. In ceremony after ceremony, he planted trees around the country and even overseas as a symbol of hope that the young tree would outlast short human lives. 

I learned about this unexpected aspect here, on the website of the cabin where he spent his last years, which explains so much. Firmly Planted — U.S. Grant Cottage National Historic Landmark

I'm glad to learn all that about Grant from his cryptic boulder, but sad to learn that in Washington, D.C., they planted a Bur Oak. If Grant had planted a Bur Oak in Washington Park, a tree that evolved to thrive in our bad soil, it would almost certainly be there by its boulder today. 

 (Tree elevation looking south - Grant Memorial Bur Oak , Union Square, Southeast of Ulysses S. Grant Memorial, Washington, District of Columbia, DC | Library of Congress (loc.gov)j)