Damage to an Ancient Tree

It is not known if it was the victim of lightning, wind, old age and gravity, or a combination of some or all of the above, but between Saturday night and Sunday morning one of the venerable old trees in Washington Park, a.k.a. Courthouse Square, suffered severe but hopefully not irreparable damage.

Photo: Llew Young

Photographic evidence suggests that the tree is older than the current courthouse and indeed was already a fairly substantial tree when the first courthouse to occupy the site, built around 1837, was there. (The current Warren and Wetmore courthouse, completed in 1907, is the third to be built at that location.) If you look to the right in the photograph below, which shows the courthouse that existed before 1900, I believe you will see the tree now critically damaged as it was when it was young.

Photo courtesy Historic Hudson

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