Tuesday, June 9, 2020

NATURE'S TRYLON AND PERISPHERE


"Strange As It Seems," San Pedro News Pilot, September 21, 1939
Strange As It Seems was a syndicated cartoon feature published from 1928 to 1970. It competed in newspapers with Ripley's Believe It or Not! cartoons. The founder of Strange As It Seems, John Hix, boasted that every published fact was verified by a minimum of three sources. Hix said the feature was a library of "the curious, in nature and humankind, set adrift on the vast sea of public opinion with the hope that it will fulfill its mission to entertain and acquaint its viewers with some of the marvels of the world in which we live." At its peak the strip was printed in 1,300 newspapers. 

The September 21, 1939 version of Strange As It Seems highlighted one of the well-known monarchs of Big Trees Grove … “Known as the ‘Giant Burl tree’ is this huge Sequoia sempervirens, which actually grew from the cut stump of an earlier tree. The burl itself, a natural [excrescence] measuring 6x8x4 feet, developed from a wound at the tree’s base.”

Author's Personal Collection
Burls are the hard, woody growth usually found at the base of some redwood trees. The swirled grain patterns of burl result from the entwined growth around clusters of dormant buds and are valued by woodworkers for their beauty. 

New York World's Fair 1939 commemorative plate - Author's Personal Collection
The unique shape of the Giant Burl Tree was described in Strange As It Seems as Nature’s Trylon and Perisphere. This reference comes from the 1939 New York World’s Fair. The Trylon and Perisphere were two monumental modernistic structures designed by architects Wallace Harrison and J. Andre Fouilhoux, which together, became the symbol of the fair.

Though the author of Strange As It Seems believed that he knew the reason for the appearance of the Giant Burl Tree, the current consensus is, we just don't know for sure. 

Note: "Strange As It Seems," incorrectly referred to the location of the Giant Burl Tree as being in Santa Cruz Canyon. Of course, they should have said, San Lorenzo Canyon. And to be most accurate, they should have said, Big Trees Grove.

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