American Forests and Garden.Com to Offer Historic Trees, Planted by American Folk Hero Johnny Appleseed, On the Internet for Consumers Who Want to Share a Piece of American History.

AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 23, 1998--Just days before the September 26th birthday of American folk hero Johnny Appleseed (nee John Chapman), Garden Escape, Inc. (www.garden.com), a leading online retailer of gardening products, information, and services, and American Forests (www.amfor.org), the nation's oldest (1875) non-profit conservation organization, today announced that the two organizations will join efforts and make available on the Internet small trees from American Forests' Famous and Historic Trees program. Beginning with the offspring from trees planted by John Chapman, an American frontiersman who became known as Johnny Appleseed and planted millions of trees, Garden Escape will feature American Forests' complete line of historic trees on its Garden.com Web site by mid-October, 1998. In addition, the two organizations also announced the formation of a strategic partnership in which Garden Escape will redesign and add e-commerce capabilities to the American Forests Web site. Garden Escape will also exclusively sponsor a PBS special on famous and historic trees in America which is being produced in cooperation with American Forests.

In 1994, the Famous and Historic Trees program discovered a Rambo apple tree in Nova, Ohio, which was researched and found to have been planted by Johnny Appleseed. Small trees from this "parent" tree will be available for purchase on Garden.com (www.garden.com) beginning on September 26, with the rest of American Forests' historical tree catalog following soon after in October.

Through its Famous and Historic Trees program, American Forests identifies trees that are living witnesses to historic events and to lives of famous citizens. Each famous and historic tree is the direct offspring of the original "parent" historic tree, and seeds are collected from the original trees located at historic sites across America and grown into small trees. Famous trees include those planted by presidents, noteworthy Revolution and Civil War citizens, African American leaders, even authors and country music stars.

"Partnering with Garden Escape will enable American Forests to reach out via the Internet and inspire more and more Americans to plant trees," remarked Jeff Meyer, program director for American Forests Famous and Historical Trees. "Our organization's goal is to plant 20 million trees by the year 2000."

"Our partnership with American Forests is not only exciting, but important to our corporate pledge to help preserve the environment," said Lisa Sharples, vice president of marketing at Garden Escape. "These trees are a part of American history, and by making them available on the Internet, Garden Escape hopes to bring them into the backyards of gardeners across the country, fostering interest and awareness not only in their heritage, but also in conservation."

The two organizations will also forge a partnership for redesigning and hosting the American Forests' Web site (www.amfor.org). A leader in Internet retailing, Garden Escape will build its proprietary e-commerce technology into the new site, which will give the Famous and Historic Trees portion of the Web site the capability of taking secure orders online. The new site is set to launch in April of 1999.

In addition, Garden Escape will be the exclusive sponsor of a PBS television special on historic trees in America that is being produced in cooperation with American Forests. The one hour program will feature dozens of trees that were present at historic events or that have special connections to noted Americans like Abraham Lincoln, Mark Twain, Martin Luther King, Eleanor Roosevelt, and President John Kennedy. The special is scheduled for broadcast in April of 1999.

About American Forests

American Forests is the national conservation organization for trees and forests. Founded in 1875 by citizens concerned about the waste and abuse of the nation's forests, American Forests is the country's oldest national citizens conservation organization. Its vigorous advocacy helped create the conservation movement and public lands system in the United States. Throughout the 20th century, American Forests has been a leading voice for trees in public policy debates and an organizer of tree-planting campaigns. For more than 100 years it has published American Forests magazine. Its Global ReLeaf 2000 campaign is helping to plant 20 million trees for the new millennium. American Forests' Famous and Historic Trees project, based in Jacksonville, FL, identifies and propagates direct offspring of historic trees. The PBS television special is the first in a series of events to mark the 125th anniversary of the organization in the year 2000.

About Garden Escape

Garden Escape, founded in September of 1995, is a leading online retailer of gardening products, information and services. The company's core property, Garden.com, leads the Internet gardening category, offering gardeners an unsurpassed collection of over 12,000 high-quality gardening supplies, seasonally inspired magazine content, professional advice, and garden design software. Its founders have extensive experience in technology, electronic commerce and the gardening industry. Headquartered in Austin, Texas, Garden Escape has offices in Northern California and Iowa. Garden Escape is currently being funded by Austin Ventures, Dawson Samberg Capital Management, Global Retail Partners, Nexus Group, Oak Investment Partners, Phillips-Smith Specialty Retail Group, Scripps Ventures, and Van Wagoner Capital Management.

Garden Escape is a trademark. All other mentioned products and companies are trademarks of their respective companies.