Around Town
Farewell, Margaret: Oenoke Ridge Family Loses Well-Loved, 300-Year-Old Apple Tree
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“You will always be in our heart … because in there you’re still alive.” —Angelina Hubertus, 8, writing to the apple tree ‘Margaret’ in her diary
The Hubertus family cannot say just how or when it settled on ‘Margaret’ in naming the apple tree by the driveway of this lovingly landscaped 4-acre Oenoke Ridge Road property. Yet at some point for Gregory and Linda Hubertus, and their 8-year-old daughter Angelina, Margaret’s eyes, nose and lips took shape in the tree’s knobby trunk, and there is something in the tree’s bearing and bark (the plant is estimated to be 300 years old) that animates, gives an impression of a living thing that is more than passive. Straightaway after purchasing this upper Oenoke property last summer and moving into its 1810-built house, the Hubertuses found themselves gathering near Margaret, turning toward her—Angelina and her friends pedaling their bikes around the tree last fall, family golden-doodle Barley playing on the snow piled up near the tree this winter, and Gregory just weeks ago voicing a plan to relocate some outdoor furniture in her ample shade. “Everybody loves this apple tree,” Linda told NewCanaanite.com on a recent morning.