Merrifield, Minnesota--In 1980, Wayne Swanson planted a green ash and named it Lonnie, for his five-year-old granddaughter. Lonnie and the ash were the same height at the time: three and one-half feet. This first planting began a new springtime ritual. Each year that a grandchild is born into the Swanson family, Wayne, 72, and his wife, Jeannette, 71, gather family members for a tree planting. Wayne measures the new baby and selects and plants a tree that is the same size; an evergreen and a 5-month-old, say, might both be 24 inches high. Then Wayne makes a wooden sign bearing the baby's name and places it beside the tree.
Every spring or early summer, the nine grandchildren, who live in the Twin Cities area, take position next to their respective trees to see how tall both trees and children have grown. Wayne then records the measurements and photographs the grandchildren standing beside their trees. "For the first few years, the kids and trees stay together," says Wayne. "Then these things take off and leave the kids behind." At first he zealously tried to get an accurate measurement of the towering trees. He'd affix a tape measure to the end of a stick, grab a ladder, and enlist the help of his grandchildren. "But then I figured, nuts, I'm just going to take their picture and they can see how big their trees are. They know they've lost."
