<a href="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/2013/01/coffee-with-the-council-oak/photo-1-2/" rel="attachment wp-att-12714"><img src="http://www.tashadoestulsa.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/photo-1-500x500.jpg" alt="Council Oak Tree Tulsa Oklahoma" title="Council Oak Tree Tulsa Oklahoma" width="500" height="500" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-12714" /></a>

It's not every day a girl gets to have coffee with a tree that's four times as old as she is. It was worth the early wake-up call. That tree, she seemed to agree.

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As mighty and sprawling as the Council Oak Tree is, its marker, set out of reach behind a black iron fence, is small and plain, set flush with the ground. If it wasn't made of pink granite, I think it would probably just disappear, or sink toward the roots. Then no one would know that beneath the gnarled boughs is the birthplace of Tulsa. At least, not unless they went to the Creek Nation Council Oak Park first, where a sculpture of brass flames outshines the gray tree beyond, which they were designed to help mark and immortalize.

<a href="http://thislandpress.com/09/27/2012/the-heritage-trees/" target="_blank">Spencer McCoy wrote about the Council Oak Tree in The Heritage Trees</a>, a piece that appeared in <em>This Land</em> last fall. Learn more about the tree and its changing place in a growing city—give it a read.