This fall I was understandably upset when so many trees were cut down on the site of the new North Common TCB project. I walked among the horizontal trunks one evening and was just shocked to look at the cross sections that betrayed the ages of the fallen. I took some pictures because I knew it would not be a simple affair to count rings right there.

The tree in the photo below was 165 years old. It began growing on "Hospital Hill" approximately one year before construction of the State Hospital began. Somehow it evaded being cut back then and it grew to tower behind the main hospital building for its entire life. There was another tree I photographed that had over 220 rings. That tree was growing on the hill when Thomas Jefferson was elected president (but only after 36 ballots of the electoral voters!).

So many trees around us have histories that we cannot imagine.