How Did ‘Swastika Trees’ Appear in a German Forest?
Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
Long after Germans pulled down monuments to Nazi rule, there remained a forest outside Berlin that each fall would commemorate the Third Reich.
Planted by an unknown person, the forest in the town of Zernikow was mostly evergreen pine trees. But a few strategically placed trees belonged to a different breed and would turn yellow every autumn, carving a swastika into the landscape that could only be seen from the air.
The German government discovered the Nazi relic in the 1990’s and cut down the trees to prevent them from becoming a shrine for neo-Nazis. Experts have speculated the trees might have been planted by the Hitler Youth.
Contact Daniel J. Solomon at [email protected] or on Twitter @DanielJSolomon
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