Ginkgo tree symbolizes enduring international ties

BY BRENT FOX

The Advertiser

NovaNewsNow.com

A ginkgo tree will be the focus of an annual series of biology department events at Acadia University.

Faculty, students and university officials gathered at the foot of an 80-year-old ginkgo tree near Patterson Hall to commemorate its planter and the revived ties it represents with China.

The tree was planted by biology professor the late Dr. Parker Bayne in 1927 upon his return from China, where he had taught at Western China Union University in Chen Gtu for many years. Bayne had taken the ginkgo seeds with him upon his departure from China.

Bayne had taught biology in Chinese and had written textbooks in Chinese. The Acadia library has copies of his work.

Biology department head Dr. Marlene Snyder told those gathered that the Chinese connection has come full circle. “We have so many international students at our university,” Snyder said, “particularly from mainland China. It’s good for the university and good for us.”

Among those who participated in the event were Bayne’s son Gordon, who was born in China and grew up and worked in Wolfville; former professor and department head Dr. Merritt Gibson, who was a student of Dr. Bayne’s; university vice-president academic Dr. Tom Herman, a former biology department head; student Wei Mo of China; and university president Gail Dinter-Gottlieb.

Snyder emphasized the importance of the department’s lineage and said the commemoration event was the first of an annual series focused on various matters of importance to the department and the field.

The ginkgo tree is smaller than other local specimens of the same age, Snyder acknowledged to The Advertiser prior to the event, but can live for centuries; a millennium, even.