Tree of 40 Fruit blooming once again

Though it hasn’t had much of an audience this spring with campus mostly empty, one of the most intriguing trees on Roanoke College’s tree-laden campus is blooming beautifully again.

The Tree of 40 Fruit was planted in the Olin Hall courtyard in 2017 as a gift from the College’s Board of Trustees in honor of President Mike Maxey’s 10th anniversary at the helm, and the 175th anniversary of the College. 

The grafted tree will ultimately grow to produce over 40 varieties of stone fruit including peaches, plums and cherries, blooming in the spring and bearing fruit in the summer. To make the tree distinctive to Roanoke College, artist Sam Van Aken — a New York City-based artist — pulled varieties of fruit from around the state. In particular, he drew from Thomas Jefferson’s collection at Monticello.

Joanne Leonhardt Cassullo ‘78, a  member of the Board of Trustees, was instrumental in bringing the tree, and Van Aken, to campus. Cassullo is an art collector, and wanted to bring a piece of art to Roanoke’s campus that everyone — not just art students or art experts — could enjoy. 

The tree is a combination of interests including art, science, conservation, horticulture and more, she said. Unlike more traditional pieces of artwork, the Tree of 40 Fruit is always changing.

“It’s constantly being remade by nature,” Cassullo said.

The tree is still maturing, but Van Aken said the fact that it is still blooming so well three years after planting is a great sign. It takes two or three years to determine the grafting’s success, he said, and Tree of 40 Fruit appears to be in great shape.

Van Aken started creating grafted trees in 2011. It took him a few years to master the art of grafting, and he often made them for solo art collectors. He enjoyed working with art collectors, but wanted the work to be enjoyed in more public places.

“College campuses are the ideal location from my perspective,” Van Aken said.

Like the tree itself, college campuses represent the intersection of many disciplines. Future artists and scientists live side by side, learning and exploring together. Van Aken said he has trees on the campuses of Stanford University and Syracuse University, in addition to Roanoke College.

Cassullo has the same outlook as to how the tree relates to a college campus. The diversity of the fruit the tree will bear reminds her of Roanoke’s student body, which includes people from 43 states and 31 countries.

“For me, it’s an analogy,” Cassullo said. “You have all these students from across the United States and around the world. They come to the Roanoke College campus where they’re all living together, with all these different points of view, and then they blossom into this beautiful student body.”

The Tree of 40 Fruit isn’t the only notable tree on campus. The Arbor Day Foundation, earlier this year, recognized Roanoke as a 2019 Tree Campus USA. The program honors colleges and universities, and their leaders, for promoting healthy trees and engaging students and staff in the spirit of conservation.