Quite a number of historic trees in different parts of the 
country have been nominated recently for the Hall of Fame 
for Trees instituted by the American Forestry Association. 
And the Garden Club of America might find it interesting to 
copy this idea for a record of remarkable trees belonging to its 
members. The President of the Garden Club of America thus 
describes her giant Ginkgo tree, beginning her account by quot- 
ing from a letter of Professor Sargent to her. 
" My dear Mrs. Sloan: 
I am interested to hear about your Ginkgo tree. The oldest 
of these trees in America were planted at the Woodlands, West 
Philadelphia, by William Hamilton in 1764. There are two of 
these trees now, about seventy-five feet tall and the larger of the 
two has a trunk girth of seven feet, seven inches. The largest 
and best Ginkgo in the country of which we have any knowledge 
here is growing on the Vanderbilt place at Hyde Park where 
it was planted a little more than a hundred years ago. This 
tree is in perfect condition and when last heard from, a couple 
of years ago, measured eleven feet, two inches around the trunk 
two feet from the ground. It has a spread of seventy feet and 
is from eighty to eighty-five feet high. Your tree it seems, has 
a little larger spread of branches. ' ' Mrs. Sloan adds : ' ' My tree 
here was planted about fifty years ago, and its spread is seventy- 
six feet. The trunk girth two feet from the ground is eight feet 
six inches. The branches start from five feet six inches, labove 
the ground, to six feet, and the height is seventy-two feet six 
inches." 
Mr. Walter Jennings writes from Cold Spring Harbor of 
his Red Oak as follows : ' ' The tree to which Mrs. Pratt undoubt- 
edly referred, is a Red Oak located on property at Lloyds Neck, 
belonging to me, but it is not my home estate. The tree is seven- 
teen feet two inches in circumference three feet above the 
ground; the total spread of the branches is one hundred and 
twenty-five feet ; and its height is sixty-five feet. Its age is 
estimated at more than four hundred years. It is a remarkably 
sjTnmetrical tree, and though pronounced by experts ten years 
ago, as retrograding, it has groMTi in circumference one foot 
during the last ten years. I measure it every five years and 
was interested to observe the regularity of its growth. It grew 
six inches from 1910-1915 and the same from 1915-1920. It 
was nominated to the Hall of Fame by Mr. Paul Dana, and its 
photograph is hanging in the Arnold Arboretum, as Professor 
Sargent is much interested in its history. I think it is an 
excellent idea to include in your Bulletin an occasional article 
on "Trees," and it might be well to illustrate such articles. 
Certainly there is nothing more noble in nature than a grand 
tree like my Red Oak. ' ' 
23 
