Other places · Scottish Islands
The Big Tree, Kirkwall
The Big Tree, Kirkwall in Orkney + Shetland, United Kingdom.
Mike Pennington — CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons licence
Plan your visit
- Typical visit
- 1 h–2 h
About
The Big Tree, Kirkwall is a place of interest in Orkney + Shetland, United Kingdom — drawn from open-data sources for visitor reference. See the linked Wikipedia article for the full description.
Photo gallery
From the Wikipedia article
The Big Tree is a sycamore (Acer pseudoplatanus) in Kirkwall, Orkney. It was named "Scotland's Tree of the Year" in the annual competition held by Woodland Trust Scotland, in 2017. The tree was nominated for the Scottish competition by Andrew Richards and Hazel Flett on behalf of the Kirkwall Community Council who also won a £1,000 grant from the Scottish Woodland Trust and Postcode Lottery. The prize money was used to stage a series of competitions to engage the public with the tree in the largely treeless islands. The sycamore is thought to be more than 200 years old and now stands in the main thoroughfare of Albert Street, Kirkwall. It is under the care of Orkney Islands Council.
Excerpt from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA 4.0. See the source article linked in Sources below.
Background
History
The big tree has been used as a meeting place by generations of Orcadians, and it once stretched across to touch the windows of the building opposite. It was originally one of three trees within the privately owned garden of chemist Thomas Sclater. Sclater divided up his properties in the 1870s to create two shop fronts and started to chop down his trees to make use of the garden ground. There was a public outcry and the last tree was saved by the Kirkwall Town Council, who paid Sclater £5 to leave it standing. In a letter from Sclater to the Kirkwall Town Council dated 30 January 1875: <blockquote>Sir, To avoid litigation, and by way of compromise I hereby beg to offer to convey to the…
Sourced from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA 4.0.
- Coordinates
- 58.9825, -2.9596
- Address
- 35-41 Broad Street, Kirkwall, Orkney, KW15 1DH
- Official site
- www.orkneymuseums.co.uk
Sources
- wikidata: Q107137308 (CC0)
- wikipedia: The Big Tree, Kirkwall (CC BY-SA 4.0)
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Frequently asked questions
- Where is The Big Tree, Kirkwall?
- The Big Tree, Kirkwall is in Scottish Islands, in the United Kingdom — coordinates 58.9825°, -2.9596°.