A Tale Of Trees

You can start your tour here. 

In 2006 when the Idaho State Capital was going to be added on to the OLD trees would not be able to remain on the grounds due to size or age.

An article written

By Royce Williams  Called the Art of Trees says,

 "People began to say something ought to be done to somehow give the old trees a second life, especially the three presidential trees — a Red Oak (called Water Oak in the West) set to commemorate a visit to the state by Benjamin Harrison in May 1891, a Rock Sugar Maple from Teddy Roosevelt in 1903, and an Ohio Buckeye from Robert Taft in October 1911.

 Boise’s District 15 Republican Representative Max C. Black, a well-known woodcarver among Idahoans who whittle and carve. Representative Black said "It turned out to be a much bigger job than we thought."

The results were creative. There were wooden keys to the state, wood writing pens, bowls of every size and shape, vases, clocks, writing desks, Windsor chairs, benches for the Capitol hallways, muzzleloader gun stocks, speaker’s podiums, bookcases, busts of the presidents with commemorative trees, plaques in the shape of the state, presidential railroad cars, even fiddles.

Black used wood from five Capitol trees for his period train — Red Oak, Ohio Buckeye, Rock Sugar Maple, Ash and American Elm. Even the black smokestack on Engine No. 151 is wood stained by deteriorating nails that someone drove into the trees years ago

The train was beautiful to see.