Hard and Soft Cover can be ordered from TACF
The American Chestnut Foundation

Soft Copy Available from VATACF
CLICK HERE FOR ORDER FORM

Mighty Giants: An American Chestnut Anthology
Forward By Bill McKibben; ed. by Chris Bolgiano
Review by Randy Mayes

This most timely volume is a wonderful collection of anecdotes, photographs, and recollections of the now vanished American Chestnut tree (Castenea dentata).  It is timely in two ways, as it gathers the memories of those eldest among us, who actually grew up with this magnificent tree, and when it makes the case for continuing with efforts to return it to the forests of the eastern states.  Noted environmentalist Bill McKibben contributes a hopeful forward, and former president Jimmy Carter mines his childhood memories.

The American chestnut was the mightiest tree, a “redwood of the east,” and made up an astonishing 25% of the eastern forests from Mississippi to Maine, particularly dominant in the piedmont and Appalachian mountains.  The strong, light wood could be used for everything from cabinet making to railroad ties and telephone poles.  Unfortunately, once the Asian chestnut blight appeared at the turn of the 20th century, the chestnuts were doomed.  The blight spread rapidly, and by the 1930’s the colossal chestnuts, the most valuable trees in the forest, were gone.

This book pays homage to the fallen giants, but also points the way to a possible revival and return of this once venerated tree.  Research sponsored by The American Chestnut Foundation (TACF, publisher of this tome) has shown great promise via both backcrossing of surviving plants to try to incorporate resistance to the blight, and the possibility of weakening the blight by attacking it with another agent.

Even if you are not a botany fan, this book is wonderful collection of Americana, with quotes and passages from sources as varied as Thoreau, Henry Ward Beecher, Les Line, and Corby Kummer.  The book ends with a discussion of the prospects for restoring the chestnut, and the efforts of the TACF to spearhead that drive.  Founded in 1983 and now having 15 state chapters, they deserve a round of thanks for not only working to preserve the chestnut, but for compiling such a treasure trove of lore about the tree, and how pervasive a part of the first three hundred years of American history it proved to be.  Highly recommended.

Randy Mayes is an avid reader and naturalist living in Hume, Virginia. His wife Catherine is on the boards of the Virginia Chapter, TACF and the Piedmont Chapter of the Virginia Native Plant Society.  Might Giants can be ordered at www.acf.org/e-commerce/categories.asp .