The Friendship Oak Gulfport, Mississippi

Friendship Oak

There is a grand old oak tree in Long Beach Mississippi.
It stands on the front lawn of the University of Southern Mississippi's Gulf Park campus, overlooking the Gilf of Mexico.
The campus is graced with many live oaks but this is the mother tree, the largest of them all.

She is older than the United States having sprouted from the earth in approximately 1487.
Before Christopher Columbus.
Before Ponce deLeon.
Before the lost colony of Roanoke Island.
Before any European explorers had walked the land.
She has witnessed our development as a nation, our growth, our progress, our wars and our mistakes.

The Friendship Oak was last  officially measured in 2011 standing 59 feet high with a trunk diameter of 5 feet 9 inches. The circumference of the trunk is 19 feet 9 1/2 inches. It's foliage spreads out 155 feet providing 16,000 square feet of shelter.

It was a great experience to sit in the shade of the tree.  To put my hand on its trunk and feel a part of something so precious. The friendship oak has limbs that have stretched so far out to the side that their weight has pulled them back to the ground where they rest and then continue.
If you are near Long Beach Mississippi I recommend that you come and sit for a while. Breathe the air filtered by it's leaves and enjoy the shade.
It's good for your soul.

Friendship Oak
University of Southern Mississippi Gulf Park Campus
730 East Beach Blvd
Long Beach,
Mississippi