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Sycamore Maple at Mercer's Former USDA Forestry Lab Once Traveled the Stars (WV)

from Bluefield Daily Telegraph, June 15, 2020

Sycamore Maple at Mercer's Former USDA Forestry Lab Once Traveled the Stars (WV) Bluefield Daily Telegraph, June 15, 2020 The journey of a sycamore maple standing near the former USDA Forestry Lab in Gardner started on Jan. 31, 1971, when Apollo 14 was launched. Five days later, astronauts Alan Shepard and Edgar Mitchell landed on the moon while fellow astronaut Stuart Roosa, a former U.S Forest Service smoke jumper, stayed behind to pilot the command module. He wasn't completely alone. Packed in Roosa's personal kit were containers filled with hundreds of tree seeds, part of a joint NASA/USFS project. When the astronauts returned to Earth, the Forest Service took charge of the seeds and germinated them. READ MORE

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