J. Sterling Morton, The Pro-Slavery Founder of Arbor Day

Did you know that the founder of Arbor Day was also a loud advocate for expanding slavery in US?
J. Sterling Morton, a newspaper man, governor of the Nebraska territory, and eventually Sectary of Agriculture, didn’t just want to plant trees for a love of nature, but also because he believed it would help expand white settlement in the Western territories.

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The Queer Ecology of NYC's High Line and Tree of Heaven

What does this notorious weedy tree, Tree of Heaven, have to do with gay cruising spaces in New York in the 80s and 90s and The High Line, now of one the city’s now most well-known green spaces?

Cherry Trees and Anti-Immigrant Sentiment

The striking colors of Japanese flower cherry trees are one of the hallmarks of Springtime in the US, so how did these plant immigrants go from being reviled and even publicly burned in the US capital to being celebrated.

Whites pines and white nationalists

What do white pines trees have to do with white Christian nationalists? How an English colonial policy on the cutting of Eastern White pine trees led to one of flags waved on January 6th and by white Christian nationalists alike.

Rubber Tree & Colonial Botanical Gardens

Rubber tree’s latex isn’t the only thing about it that’s sticky…it has a twisting past that includes the rise and power of colonial botanical gardens and creation of colonial plantation systems based on imported exotic plants, imported labor, and support from these botanical institutions.

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The Queer Ecology of NYC's High Line and Tree of Heaven

Cherry Trees and Anti-Immigrant Sentiment

Whites pines and white nationalists

Rubber Tree & Colonial Botanical Gardens