Work Basin | Range Fieldworks Italia Paesaggio Distant Encounters Some Agricultural Exhibits Passage We R Not Done The Holy City Picher, Oklahoma First Light, Last Day of Summer Placing Memory
Publications
Books
The Garden
Info
CV | Bio Contact

Metadata Set for Prometheus/WPN-114, Robert Bailey, 2016

  • Basic description: a bristlecone pine tree (Pinuslongaeva)
  • Name: Prometheus
  • Giver of name: Darwin Lambert and friends (c. 1958-1961)
  • Designation: WPN-114
  • Designator: Donald R. Currey (c. 1963-1964)
  • Original location: Wheeler Peak, White Pine County, Nevada
  • Elevation of original location: about 10,700 feet (about 3,261 meters)
  • Date of germination: c. 2898 BCE
  • Height of tree: 17 feet (dead crown), 11 feet (living shoot)
  • Circumference of tree: 252 inches at 18 inches above ground
  • Bark growth on tree: 19-inch wide north-facing strip covering 8% of circumference
  • Erosion of tree: pith missing below 76 inches above the ground or 100 inches above the original base
  • Date of tree’s felling: early August 1964
  • Feller of tree: Donald R. Currey and members of the United States Forest Service
  • Reason for felling tree: unclear and contested
  • Topic of Currey’s research: the Little Ice Age of c. 1300-late 1400s that continued untilc. 1870
  • Funder of Currey’s research: National Science Foundation
  • Currey’s affiliation: graduate student, Department of Geography, University of NorthCarolina
  • Giver of permission to fell the tree: Donald E. Cox, Humboldt National Forestdistrict ranger
  • Process of preparing tree for further study: two horizontal slabs (one slab from theinterval 18-30 inches above the ground and the other, smaller slab including the pith from 76 inches above the ground) fitted together and smoothly finished to be used in dating the tree; other sections finished and/or polished for display
  • Arrangement of rings in sectioned slab: concentric and uncomplicated
  • Original estimation of age: 4,844 years old (by Donald R. Currey)
  • Current estimation of age: 4,862 years old (by Donald Graybill)
  • Possible age: >5000 years old
  • Current locations of tree: Wheeler Peak, Great Basin National Park, White Pine County,Nevada (stump); Great Basin National Park Visitor Center, Baker, Nevada (sections); Ely Convention Center, Ely, Nevada (sections); Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona (sections used to date the tree); Institute of Forest Genetics, Placerville, California (sections)
  • Estimated number of human beings that saw the tree alive: fewer than 50
Using Format