Newspaper Clipping of the Day

"Brooklyn Eagle," May 30, 1911, via Newspapers.com

As I have mentioned before, I have a particular fondness for Weird Wills, and the following story is one of the most charming examples.  From the “Baltimore Sun,” September 15, 1907:

Imagine a tree being a landowner! Having its own property rights, enjoying the protection of the United States and feeling that never, no never, will there be need of any such petitions as "Woodman, spare that tree!" in reference to its own majestic height of trunk or girth of spreading branches. Yet such a tree actually exists and is growing luxuriantly today in the town of Athens, Ga., and its history is this: 

The tree is a magnificent oak, which has stood for a century or more upon a piece of ground located at the corner of Dearing and Finley streets, whose latest owner was a Mr. William H. Jackson. The property had long been in the possession of the Jackson family and its late owner was born within hearing of the murmurous winds that swayed the oak's great branches.  As child and boy he had played beneath its refreshing shade and in his old age so tenderly did he regard this tree fraught with memories that before his decease he made a will bequeathing to the tree all the land upon which it stands, so that time and storm might be the only foe that can approach it. 

The bequest reads: "For and in consideration of the great love I bear this tree and the great desire I have for its protection for all time I convey entire possession of itself and all land within eight feet of the tree on all sides for all time to come. William H. Jackson." 

In a court of law this document would scarcely stand, but beneath all the rough surfaces of mankind there is within humanity a great and tender respect for any deep sentiment or feeling. Hence the people of Athens, Ga., have accepted the splendid oak tree as a citizen, with the rights and protection due it as such and no branch nor twig of the oak that owns itself is touched by desecrating fingers. In the great sleetstorm of 1903 many of the oak's huge branches were broken and Mr. George Peabody sent a gift of $100 to have the limbs trimmed, the earth, which had slipped from the roots thrown back upon them and an iron fence put about it and thus protected the tree now stands. 

Athens, Ga., has a beautiful university campus with another famous tree upon it beneath which Robert Toombs, the celebrated orator, is said to have made his first speech; the old house where lived the sweetheart of John Howard Payne, the wanderer who wrote "Home, Sweet Home," stands upon one of Athens' streets, the city has picturesque and famous houses upon every side, but of all its quaint traditions and stories the old Georgia University town is proudest of the story of the beautiful oak tree, and of the man who so loved it that he left to his town the delight of forever gazing upon it so long as spared by the hand of time.

The tree--which may have dated as far back as the 16th century--fell in 1942, but a new tree was sprouted from one of its acorns, and planted in the same spot.  (It is often known as “Son of the Tree That Owns Itself.”)