For many 



m 



THE FALL OF RHODE ISLAND'S MONARCH PINE 



BY JESSE B. MOWRY 



SOMETIME near the first of March, the great White 

 Pine, at Spring Grove, one of the chief attractions 

 at that summer resort, fell with a mighty crash 

 victim to a southwest gale destroying surrounding tim- 

 ber and startling wild life in the vicinity. So far as I 

 know, it was the largest White Pine on earth, and was 

 owned by Andrew J. Steere, of Chepachet, whose father, 

 one hundred years ago, was offered $100 for the tree to 

 make a big mill shaft. 



So great was the general interest in this veteran of 

 the woods that several years ago the following letter, 

 giving dimension measurements and other information, 

 was published in the Pascoag Herald: 



"In response to inquires which from time to time 

 come from far and near relative to the White Pine 

 standing near Spring Grove, its measure was taken with 

 forest instruments on this date. Diameter, breast high, 

 45 inches; circumference, breast high, 12 feet; total 

 height, 1 1 1 feet ; merchantable log length, 85 feet ; con- 

 tents of the trunk, 500 cubic feet equal to 3000 board 

 feet more or less. For trees of its class, it has a quick 

 taper. Its age no man can now tell. The Maine Log 

 Rule for edged inch boards and one-quarter inch saw kerf 

 gives the yield of its 12-foot butt log, 1,051 board feet. 



"This tree stands in a ravine near the border line be- 

 tween two well known types of soil the Alton stony 

 loam and the Glocester stony loam. A rivulet running 

 through the gravel near its roots emits a strange gurgling 

 sound. This year it produced a large quantity of seed 

 eaten by that testy little shade-tail the red squirrel. 

 This is one of the largest trees of the species in North 

 America today, and the few remaining veterans of the 

 forest primeval will soon be gone and gone forever. 



"Several years ago a White Pine cut in Pennsylvania 

 was 351 years old. Its diameter breast high was 42 

 inches; total height, 155 feet; length of log used, 114 

 feet ; total volume of stem 574 cubic feet which scaled 

 3-335 Ieet f merchantable lumber. 



"Some of the log rules in use make such large dis- 

 counts for waste in milling and defect in logs that they 

 fall far short of the mill tallies for single sound logs. 

 But for native pine logs less than 20 feet long the Maine 

 rule is fairly accurate, having been carefully tested many 

 times at the saw. Sawyers not familiar with the meth- 

 ods of constructing log rules sometimes think the rule 

 inaccurate because it does not happen to agree with the 

 actual cut of some particular log for example a cut of 

 310 feet from a 12-foot log of 23 inch top diameter, for 

 which the Maine rule gives 300 feet. But the average 

 cut from 10 or more fairly straight sound logs of those 

 dimensions would prove the general correctness of the 

 rule. 



"The cut of logs of the same dimensions is varied by 

 many factors such as thickness of saw, thickness of 

 boards, thickness of sawyer, waste in slabbing, trueness 

 in set-up, defects in logs, rate of taper, shrinkage, etc." 



THE GREAT WHITE PINE 



years the pride and boat of Rhode Island 

 it fell in March, in the year of 



Strangely enough, 

 falling monarch*." 



