Readers’ pick: Cherry tree in front of Monroe Hall
They say bigger is always better.
The Hatchet selected the biggest and best tree on campus for this year’s Best of Northwest Guide – the oak on the corner of 24th Street and New Hampshire Avenue. The oak tree soars to about eight stories – or 88 feet – and boasts thousands of verdant leaves that ignite the edge of campus in the spring and summer before fermenting into hazel foliage in the fall.
During walks to the Milken Institute of Public Health building for long study sessions during finals weeks, its imposing and immovable trunk helps calm me down before I hit the books. If it can endure climate change, I can write an essay. In the winter, the tree becomes a bramble of naked branches, a depressing state, before its rebirth in the spring.
The tree is at its best during sunny spring, summer and fall days when I can grab a lemonade or apple fritter doughnut from the 7-Eleven across the street before sitting on the benches around its base to bask under the tree’s organic awning.
I used my roommate’s tape measurer to record the circumference of the oak tree – it clocked in at about 141 inches, or 358 centimeters. Mitchell’s Rule, a method to calculate an oak tree’s age by dividing its girth in centimeters by 1.88, the average growth per year, shows the age of the tree is about 190 years old. Holy cow. The tree has been around since about the 1830s – potentially making it one of the oldest relics in the neighborhood and the District.
It seems like the District Department of Transportation could consider it reaching the standard for protected trees in the city. DDOT designates trees with a circumference between 44 to 99.9 inches as special trees and trees with a 100-inch stomach as heritage trees. Both special and heritage trees are government-protected flora, but this year’s Best of Northwest tree eclipses the classification required for protection. If it does become a protected oak, I am sure it will be stoked.
While the Foggy Bottom neighborhood is brimming with beautiful trees along sidewalks and parks, the giant oak tree on 24th and New Hampshire Ave. stands above the rest.
