Lori Piestewa Honored in Tree Dedication in PA

Lori Piestewa, the first female American-Indian soldier to be killed as a result of injuries suffered during combat in Iraq will be honored in the naming of a very special oak tree in Solebury, Pennsylvania.

The white oak sapling was sprouted from the acorn of an ancient, 516 year old legendary oak tree that had succumbed to disease and a lightening strike in May 1999.The much loved tree with it’s broad near perfect shape and huge size had been a gathering place for schoolchildren who would form a circle around the trunk and couples who would marry in its shade.

While colonial settlers felled thousands of acres of trees in Bucks County to clear land for farms, this particular oak survived. According to legend, the Lenni Lenape Indians held gatherings beneath its boughs. By the end of the 20th century, the Columbus Oak, as it was known, stood like a solitary sentinel in a field off Aquetong Road. It had grown to 68 feet in height, 29 feet in circumference and more than 140 feet from side to side.

Only a rotting stump now remains a silent sentinel marking the location of so much history. Now, an acorn from the fallen tree that was nurtured into a young oak that will be planted in the roots of the mother. The Solebury Township Historical Society will also dedicate a plaque at the site of the Columbus Oak below Bowman's Tower and across the street from the Thompson Memorial Presbyterian Church.

Piestewa, a Hopi from Arizona, was chosen to represent the tree because of the ideals she represented as an American Indian, says Crooks, as well as the significance of what the tree meant to the early Indian tribes. The Native American Society also will participate in the celebration.