Good luck with your garden. I loved the story about your father. Does that town still exist somewhere? Can you go back there some day and say, my dad planted those trees?He would buy 50-100 high quality trees once a year and plant them anywhere he thought needed a tree.
The last of my family moved away from Michigan this year. I can't imagine that if I went back I'd do a tree tour and the chances of me heading back there any time soon are slim. I don't think my dad minds leaving the trees behind too much. He always looked at trees as an investment of 50-100 years. He would talk about what a great tree a white oak would become long after he was dead. He was saddened when he sold property and people cut trees down. It's hard to understand why anyone would cut down a nice hard wood that probably had a value in the hundreds of dollars (maybe more but it seems kind of crass to but dollar values on stuff like trees) but he knew it wasn't his tree anymore. A man who lived near a piece of property my family used to own came into the lot and cut down one of my fathers evergreens as a Christmas tree one year. My dad took him to small claims court and won a bit of compensation. He wasn't in it for the money (a guy who buys trees by the score to plant random places isn't in it for the money). Dad got into a bit of trouble with the city when he planted a Japanese maple in a nature reserve that was skipping distance to his property. There was talk of pressing charges and he was told that he shouldn't plant anymore trees on any city property (pretty sure he violated that more than a few times). Dad is a real strange guy who is very passionate about his hobbies. I stand to inherit more than 600 cookie jars and will have to deal with lot of other oddball stuff when he passes someday.
How great that he's still around and you can ask him questions. I wish my father was around. He died in 1969. In the 00s I started Googling my father and was able to find things he wrote before I was born and things that were written about him long after he died. It was weird and thrilling. Good luck with your garden! You must be somewhere snow-free.