Teaneck hopes to breathe second life into pieces of felled 300-year-old oak tree
By RICHARD COWEN, Staff Writer
The Record, September 20, 2014
The stately red oak that stood in Teaneck for about 300 years before falling to the ax is getting a new life.
Cut down last year amid concerns that disease and rot had made it a safety hazard, the red oak appeared headed to the (saw)dustbin of history.
But not so fast. The Bergen County Department of Parks has teamed up with the Puffin Foundation to offer a piece of the tree to anyone who wants to give it a kind of second life — as art.
The parks department has scheduled two days in October when any artisan, artist, wood-crafter or plain old tree-hugger can pick up a piece of the mighty red oak, free of charge.
Since coming down in June 2013, much of the tree has been stored in bits and pieces in two warehouses in Bergen County. The uncut tree trunk and limbs have been in storage at the Saddle River County Park in Rochelle Park. The rest of the tree has been milled into slabs and planks and is at Campgaw Mountain County Park in Mahwah.
The pickup days are Oct. 7 at the Saddle River County Park storage area on Lotz Lane, and Oct. 9 at Campgaw Mountain County Park, via Fike Road. Pickups are between the hours of 2 and 7 p.m.; parks staff will assist people in cutting wood and moving it to their vehicles.
“It was a mammoth tree,” said Gladys Miller-Rosenstein, executive director of the Puffin Foundation. “It would be a shame if it was just discarded.”
Mammoth might be an understatement. As measured in 2010, the oak was 80 to 85 feet tall and close to 200 feet wide. The trunk was listed as about 70 inches in diameter and 18½-feet in circumference.
Miller-Rosenstein said no one is certain how old the tree was when it was chopped down, but the estimates ran between 250 and 300 years old. “It withstood hurricanes and 80 mile an hour winds,” she said.
As the tree grew bigger, there were numerous threats to chop it down, but each time preservationists rushed in to save it. The Teaneck-based Puffin Foundation, which is dedicated to advancing the arts, became the tree’s biggest defender.
Then in 2013, Bergen County, which is responsible for maintaining the tree and the safety of the intersection, determined that the red oak had to go. Bergen County found the tree was suffering from decay and termite damage and posed a risk to pedestrians and motorists.
But Miller-Rosenstein said the tree did not outlive its usefulness. It’s sturdy wood, she said, would make for a great bench, kiosk or furniture.
“When they were cutting it down, a lot of people came up to me and said, ‘I’d love a piece of that wood,’Ÿ” Miller-Rosenstein recalled. “Now here’s their chance. We hope people take a piece home.”
