The Angel Oak on Johns Island, South Carolina, is said to be more than 1,400 years old and the oldest living thing east of the Mississippi River.
re
forty-five members has grown to more than six thousand today.
National Tree
girth, of thirty-eight feet. This oak tree was a sapling when Charlemagne was being crowned emperor in Europe in AD 800, and it still stands, a silent witness to our changing world. The Seven Sisters Oak is officially regis- tered in the Live Oak Society, a society whose membership is com- posed entirely of oak trees with a girth of at least eight feet. The society was founded in 1934 to promote the culture, preservation, and apprecia- tion of the live oak. What began with
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In 2004, the Arbor Day Foundation hosted a nationwide contest to select a national tree. Since America has so many beautiful trees, it was a difficult choice: would the voters choose the majestic redwood, or perhaps a fruit tree like the apple or cherry? While there are many ways that the oak tree has been an important part of Ameri- can culture and history, the simplest reasons perhaps explain why it won the vote. Maybe the voters remem- bered the beautifully carved oak chairs that they sat on in their grandparents’ dining room, or the
nearby oak buffet or sideboard holding the pie that finished off the meal. Or were they captivated by the interest- ing patterns in the wood of their oak bedroom dressers, with lines that twist and swirl through the honey- colored surface, almost alive with movement? Maybe some of them recalled the initials that they had mischievously carved in an oak tree trunk, only to rediscover them twenty years later? For whatever reason, the people’s choice was the oak tree, a splendid and dignified symbol of our national heritage.
In November of 2004, Congress passed legislation officially recogniz- ing the oak as America’s National Tree. It was the perfect choice. ■
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PHOTO: MARY ANN CHASTAIN/AP
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