Branches of history: Celebrate Arbor Day with a timeline of historic trees in the U.S.

To exist as a nation, to prosper

as a state, and to live as a people,

we must have trees.

— Theodore Roosevelt

Prior to Earth Day showing up on the April calendar, Arbor Day was, and still is, celebrated on the fourth Friday in April. Trees, especially oaks, played a role in our country’s history long before they got a day of their own. With that perspective in mind, please read on.

Trees in American history

1686: Jeremiah Wadsworth saves the Connecticut Charter from the Royal Governor by hiding it in the hollow of an old oak tree. The tree later becomes known as the Charter Oak.

1758: Evangeline and other Acadians disembark under the shade of an oak in St. Martinville, Louisiana.

1774: Johnny Chapman, known as Johnny Appleseed, is born in Massachusetts. He moves west, across the Midwest, planting thousands of apple trees.

1775: George Washington takes formal command of the Continental Army beneath a large elm tree.

1804: The Council Oak, near what is now Sioux City, was some 150 years old when Lewis and Clark held council with Native Americans by the tree.

1807: Aaron Burr is tried for treason under the oaks of Washington, Mississippi. (These, of course, would be Burr oaks.)

1815: Andrew Jackson and his troops take shelter under Louisiana’s Sunnybrook Oaks on their way to the Battle of New Orleans.

1854: The Republican Party is founded beneath the shade of a grove of white oaks. Connecticut’s Charter Oak is destroyed by a storm.

1857: Sam Houston kisses young women who stitched and gave him a Texas flag under what is now known as the Sam Houston Kissing Bur Oak in San Marcos, Texas.

1863: On July 3, during the Battle of Gettysburg, a black walnut witnessed Confederate major General Pickett lead his troops against Union positions. Over 6,000 soldiers died during this engagement. Union General John Gibbon was wounded near what is now known as the Brig. Gen. John Gibbon witness tree.

1872: The first Arbor Day is celebrated in Nebraska.

1879: The “spreading chestnut tree” (actually a horse chestnut), under which Longfellow’s village blacksmith stood, is cut down to widen roads in the Boston area.

1912: Washington, D.C.’s, celebrated cherry trees are first planted. Thirty varieties were received as gifts from Japan.

1913: Alfred Joyce Kilmer publishes his famous poem, “Trees.”

1930: Dutch elm disease is first discovered in the U.S.

1936: After winning four track and field medals in Berlin, Jesse Owens was presented with an oak sapling. He donated the so-called Hitler oak to Cleveland’s Rhodes High School.

1949: Aldo Leopold’s environmental classic, “A Sand County Almanac,” is published. In an essay printed about 10 years earlier, he wrote, “ … He who owns a veteran bur oak owns more than a tree. He owns a historical library, and a reserved seat in the theater of evolution.”

1965: A University of Vermont study shows a dramatic decline in the sugar maple population. The decline may be due to acid rain.

1966: Early tests show that taxol, a chemical derived from Pacific yew, has cancer-fighting properties.

1984: The largest bur oak in Seattle is “hideously decapitated,” reports Arthur Jacobson.

1995: An elm outside the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City withstands the tragic bombing. “The Survivor Tree” now lives in a walled memorial.

1996: The Asian long-horned beetle is discovered in Brooklyn munching on horse chestnuts and Norway maples.

2001: A callery pear survived the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Known as the Survivor Tree, the pear is now part of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum.

2023: A deadly wildfire scorched the Hawaiian Island of Maui. The worst of the damage occurred in Lahaina, a historic town on the island’s western coast. Planted in 1873, one Lahaina banyan tree survived this inferno.

2025: A fatal conflagration sweeps across communities and forests in California. Living trees are seen adjacent to destroyed residences. Live trees contain more moisture and are less combustible than the adjacent buildings. Hopefully, there will be numerous “survivor trees” found growing on the scarred California landscape.

The wonder is that we can see these trees and not wonder more.

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

Sources for this timeline include Arbor Day Foundation, American Heritage Trees, and others.

Mark Spreyer is executive director of the Stillman Nature Center in Barrington. Email him at stillmangho@gmail.com.