The Centennial Stump — Kings Canyon And The Fight For The Redwoods

Before the redwood conservation movement gained its footing, California’s redwoods—coastal and sequoia—were under voracious assault by the timber industry, livestock ranchers, and settlers eager to put down stakes in what looked like paradise. Discovery of these gargantuan trees sparked land clearing, railroad development, jaw-dropping awe and wonder—and led to the loss of 95% of the world’s redwood biomass, before we pulled back from the brink of extinction.

This image—titled Numquam, Latin for “Never Again”—depicts the 24-foot wide Centennial Stump, so named for the purpose for which it was cut down: to be chopped up and featured as an exhibition at the country’s centennial exposition in Philadelphia in 1876. It’s located in the General Grant Grove of Kings Canyon National Park. A National Park Service marker nearby tells the sad, and ironic, tale:

This tree was cut in 1875, and a 16 ft. section sent to the Philadelphia centennial exhibition of 1876.

Only the outer shell was exhibited, the parts being reassembled after shipment. Eastern people refused to accept the exhibit as part of a single tree and called it a “California hoax.” It took 2 men 9 days to chop down the tree. Its upper trunk is the scarred log down slope from the grant tree. Ladies from a nearby logging camp used to conduct Sunday school services for their children upon the stump.

This morning was chill when I decamped from my rooftop tent and headed to the grove. I had been here the day before and had my eye on several trees, and stories within them. Bright sun was beginning to stream through the canopy, while pockets of snow remained here and there. I did not set out to photograph the Centennial Stump, but reading the plaque left me no choice. This is the story of the redwoods and the pain of taking them for granted. The site feels almost like a mausoleum—the massive stump surrounded by the sequoias that were here when the cutting finally stopped.

Provenance: Arca-Swiss Field-Metric 8x10 • Fujifilm 300mm • Kodak Ektar 100

We don’t write much about the equipment used to create an image, any more than other artists talk about what brand of charcoal, pencil, or paint brush they use. But here it’s a part of our retelling of this tree’s story. This image began on 8x10 Kodak Ektar 100 film, and was recorded using an Arca-Swiss F Metric field camera. View cameras were invented in the 1830s—many centuries after this tree was already thriving, vibrant and scraping the sky—so it seemed fitting to bring a piece of the past to record this tree’s permanent contribution to the redwood conservation movement. This image is part of a project that will, with any luck, become a book about the sense of wonder these trees help us feel.