Devoted Stewards of Old Knockle ✦ Burnt Bend, Ohio
Est. April 11, 2020 · 84 members
— a likeness, drawn by Marin H. from memory —
i. What Is Old Knockle?
Old Knockle is an American hornbeam (Carpinus caroliniana) standing in a clearing behind the long-shuttered Pinegrove Putt-Putt off County Road 9, in the unincorporated community of Burnt Bend, Ohio. She is, by every reasonable measure, an ordinary tree. She is also, by the lived experience of her eighty-four observers, the most extraordinary living thing we have ever stood beside.
This page is a love letter. We are not a registered nonprofit. We are a Discord server, a carpool, and a small ring of folding chairs that we keep in Doreen's garage and haul out to the clearing on the second Saturday of every month, rain or shine, ticks or no ticks.
We started in lockdown. Most of us did not know each other on April 10, 2020. By April 12 we had a server, a calendar, a shared spreadsheet of times we had each independently heard the humming, and an inside joke about sourdough that I will not explain because it has gotten too big.
ii. Vital Statistics
Species
American hornbeam — known locally as musclewood, for the way her bark coils like a forearm flexing
Estimated Age
between 280 and 310 years (core sampling declined, on principle)
Height
34 ft, 7 in — measured by Wesley T. with fishing-line and a level on 09/05/2021
Trunk Girth
9 ft, 4 in at chest height — and 9 ft, 5 in when re-measured three weeks later
Lean
14° east-northeast, holding steady since 2017
First Photographed
July 1958, in the corner of a Polaroid taken of someone's nephew (no one remembers whose)
Known Names
Old Knockle (current); The Bent Lady (1970s); "that hornbeam, you know the one" (always and forever)
Favorite Weather
the hour after a thunderstorm, when everything is dripping and apologizing
iii. What We Have Witnessed
Below are documented occurrences. They are not the only ones. They are the ones at least three members have independently logged in #sightings.
October 4, 2017 · persistentOld Knockle migrated approximately fourteen inches to the southeast over the course of a single afternoon. Pip Pipkin had marked the original base with a tent stake the previous May. The stake is still there. So is she. They are no longer in the same place.
most autumn evenings · recurringA low, resonant hum issues from somewhere inside the trunk between approximately 7:14 and 7:51 PM. Aunt Bea, who is hard of hearing, feels it in her teeth. The rest of us hear it like a refrigerator three rooms away. Doreen swears she can hum back and Old Knockle adjusts pitch.
since at least 1962 · ongoingA small ring of mushrooms appears in the clearing every spring — always seven, never six, never eight — exactly seventeen paces from the trunk at a bearing of 112°. They are Marasmius oreades, which is normal. The count is not.
March 12, 2020 · single occurrenceKayla Henstreet saw a branch on the south side bend slowly down toward her while she was crying. She had not told anyone about the layoff yet; she told the tree first. The branch returned to its original position by morning. Two weeks later the server existed.
recurring · every visitor reports some versionIf you sit at the base for longer than twenty minutes without speaking, you will, at some point, find that you have been gently and politely answered. You will not be able to articulate the question. You will know what to do next. This happens to skeptics too. Just ask Jeremy from Akron.
noted by every member, every seasonShe remembers you. None of us can explain it, and after four years we have stopped trying. We know the second visit is different from the first, and the third is different again, and that by the fifth visit she greets you before you have finished crossing the clearing.
May 30, 2021 · single occurrence, multi-witnessDuring the Society's first in-person picnic (eleven people, two pies), every chickadee in the clearing fell silent at exactly the same moment. They resumed, in unison, ninety seconds later. We were also silent. We are not sure who was waiting for whom.
“She is not a mystery to be solved. She is a neighbor to be visited.”
— Doreen Hollis-Tate, co-founder, on the front page of every newsletter since June 2020
iv. Field Reports
Pulled, with permission, from #sightings — our most active channel and our slowest, most beloved group chat.
KH
kayla_h11/03/2023 · 8:42 PM
guys i sat with her tonight for like an hour. brought the sourdough starter for company. she liked it. don't ask me how i know, she just did 🌾
MT
marcus.t (cartographer)11/03/2023 · 8:44 PM
the starter approves of HER, kayla. that's how a starter works. they're little community members. they have OPINIONS.
DH
doreen 🌳11/03/2023 · 8:51 PM
both can be true
PP
pip_pipkin11/04/2023 · 6:12 AM
stake is still there. measured this morning. she's moved another 3/8 of an inch since september. SHE IS WALKING, FRIENDS. SLOWLY. WITH PURPOSE. with the patience of something that has nowhere to be by a particular date.
JM
jeremy_from_akron11/04/2023 · 6:14 AM
pip it's called soil heave
PP
pip_pipkin11/04/2023 · 6:14 AM
jeremy why are you in this server
JM
jeremy_from_akron11/04/2023 · 6:15 AM
because i love her too. just differently. and i bring the cooler.
AB
auntbea194711/04/2023 · 7:01 AM
she hummed twice last night. one long, one short. felt like a hello and a please-water-the-mushrooms. i watered the mushrooms. they look pleased about it but mushrooms always look pleased.
RP
ro.pinch11/04/2023 · 9:18 AM
brought my nephew yesterday. five years old. he said "the tree is a grandma." then he hugged her for nine straight minutes. she did not move but she was, i can confirm, listening.
v. Sign the Visitors' Log
If you have stood with Old Knockle — even once, even briefly — please add your name. If you have only stood with her in spirit, that counts too. The physical book lives in Doreen's garage in a tackle box wrapped in a quilt. This page is the digital flyleaf.
The Flyleaf
One entry per visit, please. She likes to be remembered specifically.
If you cannot visit her in person — and most of you cannot, and that is entirely fine — you may listen here. The humming on this page is, of course, approximate. The real one is in your teeth.
vi. Plan Your Pilgrimage
Practical Notes for First-Time Visitors
From the boarded-up front entrance of the Pinegrove Putt-Putt, walk east-northeast through the ash grove for approximately twelve minutes. You will pass a leaning culvert and a single rusted golf flag. You will know when you have arrived; the clearing announces itself.
Visiting hours: dawn until one hour after sunset. She does not sleep, as far as we can tell, but the deer do, and we try not to disturb them on their evening rounds.
Bring: drinking water, a small notebook, layered clothing, and a modest offering — an acorn, a pressed leaf, a folded paragraph from a book you love. Pastor Doug usually brings a thermos of weak tea. He shares.
Do not bring: lit cigarettes, leashed dogs (she startles them, which embarrasses everyone), or anyone who is here ironically.
Speak gently. You may speak to her. You may speak to her about anything — your day, your grandmother, your unfinished kitchen tile project, your fears. She is not a therapist, but she is patient and has nowhere else to be.
If you hear the humming, sit down. Take whatever shape the humming asks of you. It is usually a slumped, listening shape. This is correct.
Leave the clearing exactly as you found it, except for the small good feeling you brought, which you may leave behind. She is, we suspect, partly made of those.
If you would like to attend the second-Saturday gathering, message Doreen on the Discord (link below; ask politely; we hand them out one at a time, like fruit).
vii. The Founding Eleven
Met on Discord in April 2020. Met in person, masked and six feet apart, on June 27 of the same year. Still meet, every second Saturday, in the clearing, with folding chairs and a thermos rotation.