“These are kind of natural monuments,” Professor Masur said. “I find it really powerful to be in the presence of these trees that were alive at that time, maybe, in part, because they’re living things.”
Professor Masur said the destruction of the linden tree was a reminder that these artifacts are currently “under siege” at a time that the federal government seeks to reshape national parks and monuments.
Last year, President Trump complained in an executive order that the Smithsonian Institution had advanced “narratives that portray American and Western values as inherently harmful and oppressive.”
The order sought to curb the institution’s independence.
On Friday, a federal judge temporarily blocked the Park Service from removing or revising signs, films and other materials at national parks across the country to comply with the executive order.
We are becoming less familiar with the past, Professor Masur added.
“No tree can live forever, and I think it’s a sign of the passage of time, and our growing distance from the era of Lincoln and the Civil War,” Professor Masur said. “Nothing’s permanent.”