American Forestry 



VOL. XXII 



MAY, 1916 



No. 269 



The American Elm 



{Ulmits amcricoia) 

 By Samuel B. Detwiler. 



"Wise with the lore of centuries, 

 What tales, if there were tongues in trees, 

 That giant elm could tell." 



OF all our shade trees, the American elm is the most 

 aristocratic : wherever it is seen it produces the 

 impression of dignity and courtliness. Michaux, 

 the great botanist, commended it as "the most magnificent 

 vegetable of the temperate zone." It is fitting that be- 

 neath a noble elm, at Cambridge, Mass., Gen. Washmgton 



Tj— y ! — '^ 



AREA OF GROWTH OF AMERICAN ELM 



took command of the Continental iVrmy ; it is equally in 

 character that William Penn made his solemn compact 

 with the Indians in the shade of a great elm at Shacka 

 maxon, on the banks of the Delaware. Voltaire refers 

 to this agreement as "the only treaty never sworn to and 

 never broken." Although the Treaty Elm was destroyed 

 by a storm more than a century ago and only a monu- 

 ment now marks the site, the tree has been immortalized 

 in the famous painting by Benjamin West. 



Before the days of the American Revolution American 

 elms were selected for planting as symbols of liberty; 

 the most famous Liberty Trees were in Boston, Provi- 

 dence, Newport and New York. The Liberty Elm at 

 Providence, R. I., stood in Olney's Lane, and was dedi- 

 cated to the "Sons of Liberty" on July 25, 1768, before 

 a great gathering of people, in the following words: 

 "We do, in the name and behalf of all true sons of liberty 



in America, Great Britain, Ireland, Corsica, or where- 

 soever they may be dispersed throughout the world, dedi- 

 cate this tree of liberty. May all our counsels and delib- 

 erations, under its venerable branches, be guided by wis- 

 dom and directed for the support and maintenance of 

 that liberty which our forefathers sought out and found 

 under the trees in the wilderness; may it long flourish, 

 and may the sons of liberty often repair hither to confirm 

 and strengthen each other. When they look toward this 

 sacred elm may they be penetrated with a sense of their 

 duty to themselves and their posterity, and may they, like 

 the house of David, grow stronger, while their enemies, 

 like the house of Saul, shall grow weaker and weaker. — 

 Amen." 



In England it was customary for the people to gather 

 under an elm on the village green to debate public ques- 

 tions. Memories of home probably inspired the early 

 settlers of New England to plant elms in their dooryards 

 and on the village greens, and today these elms and 



LEAF BUDS AND FLOWERS OF THE AMERICAN ELM 

 The leaves are from 4 to 6 inches long, thick, rough, unequally based 

 acute at the apex and doubly toothed on the margin. The flowers 

 occur in three or four flowered clusters on drooping stalks about 

 one inch long; the buds are reddish-brown, the leaf buds are smaller 

 than the flower buds and are located toward the end of the twig 

 The flower buds are larger and are located along side of twig. 



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