Morton Arboretum researcher solves mystery of the white oak
Researchers from The Morton Arboretum and Duke University have solved a mystery that has long shrouded our understanding of white oaks: where did they come from?
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white oak
The oldest white oak tree in the country is dying — and no one knows why
Well before Columbus sailed to the New World and even before Gutenberg invented the printing press, there grew a great oak tree in a land that would one day be called New Jersey.
The oak was already old when farmers built a church beside it in 1717. And when the people came and kept coming, a town called Basking Ridge was built around the church that was built beside the tree.
