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Why plant a tree, when you can plant a town?
Fry-Wagner Moving and Storage and Suburban Lawn & Garden
Two long-standing, family-owned Kansas City businesses team-up to "re-tree"
Greensburg, Kansas, in time for Arbor Day 2010
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On May 4, 2007, an EF5 tornado leveled Greensburg, Kansas, with 205 mph winds that not only removed houses and buildings, it also removed the trees. The rebirth of Greensburg on the Kansas prairie is a 21st century pioneer story. It is the first city in America being built from the ground up to LEED-platinum standards and when finished will truly be "Green-sburg."
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Buildings can be constructed quickly, but trees take many years to grow large enough to provide shade. So when Bill and Bo Stueck, owners of Suburban Lawn and Garden in Kansas City, found themselves with a couple of hundred estate-sized trees, that were growing faster than they could sell them, they knew exactly who could use them and the decision to donate them was easy. The problem: How to move 200 big trees weighing several hundred pounds each, 300 miles west from their farm near Kansas City to Greensburg. So the Stuecks asked Larry Fry if his company, Fry-Wagner Moving & Storage could pitch-in with some "heavy hauling."
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"We've moved just about anything you can imagine over the last 100 years, but these trees are special," said Fry. "They'll be providing beauty and comfort for generations and we are happy to move them to Greensburg."
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"The City of Greensburg is so excited to know that for the first time since the tornado, we will have real shade once again. Residents were offered a chance to reserve a tree for themselves and some of the trees will be going to public areas," remarked Marsha Klein, Volunteer Coordinator. "Frankly, we thought we were just going to have to learn to live without it."
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"The trees will soon have permanent homes and there will be natural shade in Greensburg again. We are thrilled to be able to help tree-up Greensburg just in time for Arbor Day," said Bill Stueck, owner, Suburban Lawn & Garden, "And we're delighted that Fry-Wagner was able to help. We've never tried to move this many huge trees this far and this fast. I don't know that anyone else could have pulled off the logistics." It will take between 7-10 trips to get all of the trees to Greensburg. The key is to get the trees out of the ground and delivered quickly so the volunteers waiting in Greensburg can get them back in the ground quickly - all while working around the weather.
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"It's like choreographing a ballet," said Bo Stueck, "A ballet with 20 foot tall trees."
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The first load is scheduled to roll out the week of April 12th and then approximately every other day after that, with the final load arriving in Greensburg just before Arbor Day on Friday, April 30th.
