[MassHistPres] Fw: News from Preserve UMass

[Joseph S. Larson]

News from Preserve UMass

Prexy's Ridge Forest

The 24 acre Prexy's Ridge Forest in the northeast section of the UMass Amherst campus is now on the Inventory of Historic and Archaeological Assets of the Commonwealth. The Forest extends from the Chancellor's House north to Eastman Lane. It lies west of the old University Orchard and east of Thatcher Way and the Northeast Dormitory complex.

Records, photographs and maps collected by Preserve UMass demonstrate that this site was forested in 1833 and has been forested since the campus was established. Increment borings and tree ring counts taken on selected trees by faculty in the Department of Natural Resources Conservation show that some of the largest trees date from the 1700's. These data strongly suggest that this site has never been cleared and has been a "witness" to the initial settlement of East Hadley, Amherst, and the University.

In its acceptance of this site to the Inventory, the Massachusetts Historical Commission notes that the site has been a formally acknowledged as a woodland/parkland element on the campus "since at least 1900 and has been utilized as a research forest...since at least 1930." The forest is crossed by a series of woodland trails and was used as a teaching facility by Professor William Gould Vinal (1881-1976), a national leader in outdoor nature education as an outdoor teaching facility and a member of the faculty from 1937 - 1951. No old-growth forest like this appears to occur in within the built environment of any other Massachusetts town or campus.
  
Joseph S. Larson, Ph.D.
Corresponding Secretary
Preserve UMass
27 Arnold Road
Pelham, Massachusetts 01002-9757
http://myprofile.cos.com/larson358
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.cs.umb.edu/mailman/private/masshistpres/attachments/20100226/f11899d6/attachment.htm>