ROBERTSDALE, Ala. -- In April of 1934, 17-year-old Bertram Steadham asked his younger brother, 7-year-old Kenneth, to help him plant a tree for Arbor Day.

“We went into the woods and got a small magnolia tree,” says Kenneth, who is now 86 and lives in Tampa, Fla.

They took the tree and planted it near the railroad tracks, which was just down the street from their home in Robertsdale.

“He carried the tree and I carried the shovel,” Kenneth Steadham said.

Just a short time later, Bertram and brother Ralph were members of the Robertsdale High School varsity basketball team, capturing the 9th Congressional District tournament, beating Silas High School, along with one of the largest high schools in the state, Murphy, and Spring Hill, who had accepted an invitation to attend a prestigious Catholic tournament in Chicago.

Winning those three contests earned the Golden Bears a trip to the state basketball tournament in Tuscaloosa, where they played in the campus gymnasium at the University of Alabama.

Ralph Steadham would go on to finish his storied career as a two-sport star at RHS. He was a four-year performer for the RHS football team, where he played center, linebacker and kicker and was co-captain of the 1934 team.

Graduating in 1935, Ralph Steadham, now 98, a resident of Middltown, Conn., was inducted into the RHS Athletic Hall of Fame in 2008 at the age of 93.

Ken Steadham would also graduate from Robertsdale High School in 1947, while younger brother Robert, who is now 84 and also a resident of Tampa today, graduated in 1949 from RHS.

Another brother, Roy, now 88, left school in 1941 to help with the war effort, going to work for a shipyard in Mobile at the age of 16, where he would retire 45 years later. He is the only one of the brothers who still lives in Robertsdale, less than a mile down the road from where the tree was planted all those years ago.

Bertram himself would graduate from RHS in 1934, but three months later, in September of 1934, he died of a brain tumor at Mobile Infirmary hospital in Mobile.

On Oct. 7, nearly 80 years after their brother’s death, the four remaining members of the Steadham family got together to commemorate the tree planting all those years ago and to honor the memory of their brother.

Ken Steadham, who is the family historian, had a granite monument made in Atlanta, which will soon be placed at the tree. He had another monument made to honor a nephew who was killed in action, cremated and buried at sea. That monument will be placed in the Steadham family cemetery in McCullough.

“We just wanted to do something to honor these family members who had an impact on our lives,” Ken Steadham said, “and on the lives of countless others.”

Mayor Charles Murphy said city workers are building a brick structure to house the monument, which should be completed sometime in the next couple months.

Council member Sue Cooper, a member of the city’s Park, Street and Tree committee, called the monument a fitting tribute.

“It’s just such a wonderful story,” she said.