Southern Cayuga School District is among 11 sites nationwide, including the World Trade Center, Boston Common and The White House, to receive a sapling from the dying, 150-year-old chestnut tree that gave hope to Anne Frank, as she gazed upon it from her family's hiding spot during World War II.

The Anne Frank Center USA announced Friday 11 sites that will receive saplings of the tree, which is dying of a lethal fungus. The center chose from 34 applicants the sites that best exemplified the center's mission to educate about the consequences of intolerance, racism and discrimination.

And while Southern Cayuga's proposal cited its proximity to significant women's rights landmarks and dedication to educating about the Holocaust, the selection board was most touched by what the center's executive director, Yvonne Simons, described as a grassroots effort by a small school district in competition with major universities and iconic American landmarks.

“We are talking about serving kids that were about Anne's age,” Simons said. “We just felt that it was a very compelling proposal.”

Bill Zimpher, an English teacher at Southern Cayuga Middle School, proposed the idea of applying for the sapling as a way to enhance the school's history and English units about World War II, as well as its agriculture and science classes. The sapling will be planted at the middle school entrance.

“It's just a thrill and exciting to be part of this,” Zimpher said.

Zimpher's eighth-grade students act out the ending of the play version of Anne's diary, which he said helps them to better understand the history of World War II and the Holocaust. “I think it's good for them to see history through the eyes of someone their own age.”

Anne was a teenager when she chronicled the more than two years she spent in the annex rooms above her father's Amsterdam business office, where her German-Jewish family hid from the Nazis, until being discovered and sent to concentration camps. Anne was 15 when she died of typhus at a camp in 1945. Her diary, in which she describes the chestnut tree outside one of the annex's small windows, was published two years later.

The 150-year-old tree is now dying and in an effort to preserve its symbolism of hope, saplings are being distributed across the world. While many European sites are noted for their significance to the war, American sites are notable for their history of overcoming intolerance, discrimination and racism, Simons said.

“We're conspicuous for our obscurity,” said Zimpher. Indeed, the other selected sites are recognizable places - Boston Common, the World Trade Center, The White House - or notable memorials to the overcoming discrimination - Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas, among the first desegregated schools, and holocaust centers in Seattle, Michigan and Idaho.

Southern Cayuga Superintendent Mary Kay Worth said she is excited to welcome the living piece of history to her district, even though it will not arrive for two years. Once they arrive in the country, the saplings will be quarantined for two years to ensure they do not carry disease.

Worth said she has visited the annex from which Anne watched the tree and looks forward to teaching students the message of hope it had for Anne.

“There's a great message from hope there,” she said. “It can often come from youth.”

Staff writer Sarah Gantz can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 237 or sarah.gantz@lee.net

The 11 sites selected by the Anne Frank Center USA to house a sapling of the Anne Frank Tree.

• The White House, Washington, D.C.

• The Children's Museum of Indianapolis, Indiana

• Sonoma State University, California

• Washington State Holocaust Resource Center, Washington

• Boston Common, Massachusetts

• Little Rock Central High School, Arkansas

• Holocaust Memorial Center, Michigan

• Idaho Anne Frank Human Rights Memorial, Idaho

• William J. Clinton Foundation, Arkansas

• National September 11 Memorial & Museum, New York

• Southern Cayuga School District