Live Oak Log

A live oak that grew on the coast of South Carolina for over 600 years was blown over by Hurricane Hugo in 1989 and salvaged, with help from the Gervais family, along with ten trailer loads of prized live oak. Iconic to the Gervais Plantation, it was a tree under whose branches generations played on swings, and the family chose to send the butt log to Mystic Seaport rather than have it destroyed. Trees like this also served as powerful symbols of African-American community and as gathering places for social activities. On cold days, African-American people enslaved on the Gervais Plantation gathered around fires built against this tree, and burn marks within the log remain as evidence. Its gnarly growth made live oak dense and strong, long favored by shipbuilders for frames and knees in the structural system of wooden ships. Upper branches from this tree have been used in various Mystic Seaport Museum preservation projects, but there are no plans to saw up the huge log.

Mystic, Connecticut · United States