Cartoons and animated film shorts
- A Hare Grows in Manhattan (1947) is a Merrie Melodies cartoon. At the end, Bugs Bunny shows the book to a pack of menacing dogs, whereupon they turn away from him and run to Brooklyn, presumably to urinate on the tree.
- The Warner Bros. Looney Tunes animated short film Scent-imental Over You (1947), featuring Pepé Le Pew, shows multiple dogs looking through a bookstore window displaying A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.
Literature
- The book was one of the most popular Armed Services Edition books shipped to American military service personnel for free during World War II.[10] Smith said that she received ten times more fan mail from soldiers than she did from civilians.[11] The book was originally printed as series D-117 (~50,000 copies).[12][13][14] Demand for the novel was so high it was quickly reprinted as K-28.[14][15]
- The protagonist in Jeannette Walls' 2005 memoir The Glass Castle makes reference to growing up reading A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and finding inspiration in the character of Francie Nolan.
Music
- Jay-Z makes references to the title of the book in "Some How, Some Way" (from The Blueprint 2: The Gift & The Curse) and "Interlude" (from The Black Album).
- Rapper Talib Kweli refers to A Tree Grows in Brooklyn in Blackstar's track "Respiration".
- "A Flower Grows in Brooklyn" is the penultimate track on rapper Positive K's 1992 album, The Skills Dat Pay da Bills.
- The 1997 Lifetime album Jersey's Best Dancers includes a song entitled "Francie Nolan".
- British singer-songwriter Olivia Chaney recorded a song entitled "A Tree grows in Brooklyn" on her 2018 album Shelter.
Radio
On October 7, 1947 Studio One on CBS aired A Tree Grows in Brooklyn starring Rosemary Rice as Francie.
Television
- In the HBO miniseries Band of Brothers, episode 9 ("Why We Fight"), Frank Perconte is seen reading the book while on guard duty in Germany, during World War II.
- Batman, season 2, episode 13, featuring the villain Egghead, is titled "An Egg Grows in Gotham".
- Daria, season 4, episode 3 is named "A Tree Grows In Lawndale".
- In season 1, episode 17 of I Love Lucy, Lucy schemes to get her husband, Ricky, into a play she wrote called "A Tree Grows in Havana", referring to Ricky's homeland of Cuba.
- A Super Grover segment in Sesame Street, episode #4224 takes place "where two trees grow in Brooklyn."
- Season 24 of The Simpsons has an episode called "A Tree Grows in Springfield".
- Ugly Betty, season 1, episode 22 is named "A Tree Grows in Guadalajara".
- In episode 17 of the documentary series The World at War, a soldier can be seen reading the book in archival footage of soldiers preparing for the D-Day invasion of Normandy.
- Will and Grace, Series 1, Episode 2. Will notices a tree outside Grace's new apartment in Brooklyn. Grace - "See, trees really do grow here!"
- Gossip Girl, Season 5, Episode 20. Blair refuses to volunteer at a community garden, telling Dan - “Just because a tree grows in Brooklyn, doesn’t mean I have to be the one planting it”
- Morning Show, Season 1, Episode 7
- In Season 1, Episode 2 of A League of Their Own (2022 TV series), catcher Carson Shaw (Abbi Jacobson) is recommended the book by fellow player Greta (D'Arcy Carden), telling her that she "would like it". In Episode 8, Carson, now the coach, gives an inspirational speech to the team, quoting a passage from the book.
