“It’s an old tree. Older than you and me,” wrote Richard Morgado, a Mattapoisett resident. His words continue to tell of a hollow tree on his property, held up by the thick vines that encircle it. This old tree – a playground in Morgado’s youth – still stands on Dexter Lane as a memorial to its own age and history.
Morgado’s story is one of ten collected so far by the Mattapoisett Tree Committee. These accounts, written and submitted by Mattapoisett residents, tell of the aged and beloved trees in their town.
An exhibit in the Mattapoisett Free Public Library displays these anecdotes, along with photographs and other visuals, including a beautiful oil painting by Priscilla Hathaway depicting the English Linden tree of her personal story.
While the exhibit at the library will only be on display for two weeks, the Tree Committee will continue to share people’s stories at Town Hall in the future. As more stories are submitted, the committee plans to rotate them on a display next their Tree City USA plaque.
Tree Committee Chairman Sandy Hering is delighted with the townspeople’s response to their project. She hopes to have another dozen stories submitted by the end of the year.
“There are a lot of stories that people have and if we don’t record them, all of a sudden they’re going to be gone,” she said, “No one will know who planted that tree, or why was it planted, or what kind of activities used to occur underneath it. Some of the stories are really quite fun.”
Hering cited one of her favorite experiences from this project – when Mattapoisett resident Howard Tinkham brought the Tree Committee a cover of Presto Press depicting a drawing of the posting tree on his property on Long Plain Road.
Presto Press, founded in 1954, was a weekly publication that ran in the Tri-Town for nearly forty years. This piece of local history showing a drawing of the posting tree, where the town warrant used to be hung, is a treasure to both Tinkham and the Tree Committee.
“He had it lovingly framed and it’s beautifully hanging in his house right now,” said Hering of Tinkham’s Presto Press cover. The posting tree died and was removed long ago, but it is memorialized in the Presto Press drawing.
“We’re trying to make sure that people appreciate the beauty of the trees that are here right now, because once they’re chopped down, it takes so many years to regain that shade and that beauty that that tree represented to our town,” said Hering.
By collecting cherished stories in the Tree Committee’s latest community service project, Hering hopes the committee will be able to preserve this appreciation for the town’s trees. Once they’ve collected enough stories, the Tree Committee may compile them into a small book to be printed by Bristol Community College.
Along with this project, the Tree Committee is actively protecting Mattapoisett’s trees by working alongside the Highway Department on the road reconstruction of Main Street, Water Street, Beacon Street, and, eventually, Marion Road to Route 6.
“The Tree Committee has been doing a tree assessment of every tree on this route and what we hope to do is to identify the trees that are must-save trees,” explained Hering, “We hope that the work will preserve the best of the trees and new trees can be planted so that future generations enjoy a shady street.”
Trees provide more than just a shady street, and Hering illuminated the value of a green town by pointing out both the environmental and the economic benefits.
On the environmental side, trees mitigate some of the world’s global warming issues, they secure soil during storms, and their evapotranspiration process helps cool the planet.
On the economic side, Hering said, “It’s been proven that tree-lined streets are most desirable when people go to purchase houses and decide where they want to live,” so planting and preserving trees in part maintains the town’s economic value.
Some trees provide more than just environmental and economic benefits though – they can be sentimental and historical. As seen through the stories displayed in the Tree Committee’s project, many Mattapoisett residents feel strong connections to the trees they played on in their youth.
Some stories preserve a culture of an older time – Howard Tinkham submitted a story about a tree on the west side of the Mattapoisett River, which is bent to point towards a favorable crossing to the east side of the river. This tree is evidence of how early nomadic Native Americans created a trail system by bending oak saplings to point towards destinations. What seems like just an oddly twisted tree actually has a meaningful history behind it.
Mary Worden of Ocean View Avenue summed up well the sentiment behind trees in her story about two Japanese Pines when she quoted American writer Joyce Kilmer: “I think that I shall never see … a poem as lovely as a tree…”
If you have a story to share, you may submit it to Town Hall, attention Tree Committee, 16 Main Street, Mattapoisett, MA 02739.
By Renae Reints
