When Andrew Jackson went to the White House as the nation’s seventh president he took a cutting from a Magnolia tree from his home, The Hermitage, near Nashville. This branch was planted in the White House lawn in memory of his beloved wife, Rachel, who two weeks after he won the election to the presidency and prior to his March 4, 1829, inauguration.
The tree grew, prospered, and has been admired by every president since. In February 1987, President Reagan asked the highly respected Baker, who had recently retired from the U.S. Senate, to become the White House chief of staff, a position he held until July 1988. When Baker left this office to come back home to Tennessee, President Reagan and members of the National Park Service, gave the Senator a cutting from old Andy’s tree, to ‘bring back to Tennessee.’
