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Rachel Tebbe, a teaching aide at Coldwater Exempted Village Schools, and Alex Uhlenhake of Uhlenhake Landscape & Design, far right, plant a Moon Tree on Friday morning in a field across from the elementary school.
COLDWATER - A seed that flew around the surface of the moon in the Orion spacecraft in late 2022 has since germinated, grown into a small sweet gum tree and reached its final destination: Coldwater Exempted Village Schools.
One of NASA's Moon Trees that travelled into space during the Artemis I mission was rooted into the Earth on Friday morning near a cluster of memorial trees at the back of a grassy expanse across from Coldwater Elementary School where football teams practice.
The school was among about 50 institutions across the country chosen from a pool of roughly 1,300 applicants to receive a Moon Tree. Successive batches of Moon Trees will go out in the fall, spring 2025 and fall 2025.
Orion was recovered by personnel on the USS Portland from the U.S. Department of Defense, including Navy amphibious specialists, Space Force weather specialists, and Air Force specialists, as well as engineers and technicians from NASA Kennedy, the agency's Johnson Space Center in Houston, and Lockheed Martin Space Operations.
Photo via NASA
Teaching aide Rachel Tebbe wrote the application that sufficiently demonstrated the school's sustainability to care for the tree and ability to maximize educational opportunities around it in the community.
Tebbe spearheaded the initiative for a science-based project at Wright State University-Lake Campus.
"I was in my senior year of college studying elementary education, and I was student-teaching here in third grade with Anne Geier," she said.
Confident in her writing abilities, Tebbe tackled the detailed application with space-age aplomb.
"You had to have a care plan written out about how you were going to care for the tree, how you were going to get the community involved and the impact on the community," she said.
Tebbe emphasized how women are getting more involved in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), an area of study which NASA is developing unique resources and experiences to spark student interest and build a skilled and diverse next generation workforce.
"I spoke a lot about how women in STEM is becoming a much bigger thing and that with a female heading this project it would help show a lot of these younger children in our area that anything is possible," she said.
Tebbe submitted the application in September and heard nothing back for some time.
"Small town Coldwater, I really didn't expect much," she said. "But it was … two weeks ago that I got an email from NASA that said, 'Congratulations, your school has been selected to home one of these Moon Trees,' and everything moved really fast after that."
The Moon Trees include sycamores, sweet gums, Douglas firs, loblolly pines and giant sequoias. They were placed under the care of the United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service upon their return to Earth, per a NASA news release.
Coldwater was gifted a sweet gum.
"This is actually native to Ohio. They sent five different types of species up on this spaceship," Tebbe said.
One of NASA's Moon Trees that travelled into space has a new home in Coldwater.
It arrived Wednesday and was planted Friday morning by Uhlenhake Landscape & Design.
Owner Alex Uhlenhake, who also works for the village as a certified arborist, prepared and mulched the ground, planted the tree and enclosed it in fencing to protect it from animals, with the help of his crew.
Tebbe and elementary school principal Mike Etzler had settled on the spot before she sent the application to NASA.
"We talked about it in front of the school, in front of the elementary and eventually we decided that we didn't want anything nearby it just because we didn't really know what type of tree we would be getting if we were selected and how big it would grow," she recalled.
Furthermore, the public will have 24/7 access to the tree at the location.
"It's a very interesting, cool project to be part of just because it's a unique tree," Uhlenhake said, pointing to its fitting star-like leaves and noting it will bear spiky, ball-shaped fruit resembling tiny planets.
Though they're more native to southern Ohio, sweet gum trees can be found throughout Mercer County, including Coldwater Memorial Park, Uhlenhake said.
"It should be fine out here in the open. They've got really good full red color - reds, purples, oranges," he said. "They can get up to 50, 60 feet tall. They're a good sized shade tree."
Uhlenhake Landscape & Design of Coldwater plants the Moon Tree.
School officials will incorporate the little space-cadet tree into learning plans, likely with NASA educational resources and activities.
"This is just another thing to get our kids outside … kind of like a field trip outside here," Etzler said.
Tebbe wants to partner with the Armstrong Air and Space Museum in Wapakoneta to promote and direct visitors to Coldwater's Moon Tree.
"At the end of the day we're really not that far from Wapak and people come from all over to visit," she said.
Tebbe will host a community party at the site on June 11, at a time to be determined later. It will involve Moon Tree-themed snacks, activities and crafts. Though she affectionately calls the tree Luna, Tebbe said the public will have the opportunity to vote on its official name at the party.
"All the credit goes to her. She's done everything," Etzler said. "I think it's amazing. To have one here in Coldwater, it's pretty special."
Uhlenhake, too, commented on the extraordinary nature of the tree.
"I'm just happy to be part of it, and hopefully we can watch it grow over the years," he said. "Kids will be reaping the shade of this in 10, 20 years, so that's always neat to see."
The trees renew the legacy of the original Moon Trees flown by NASA astronaut Stuart Roosa during Apollo 14, according to the release.
"A new era of Moon trees will one day stand tall in communities across America," said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson in a statement. "NASA is bringing the spirit of exploration back down to Earth because space belongs to everyone. The Artemis Generation will carry forth these seedlings that will be fertile ground for creativity, inspiration, and discovery for years to come."
