Tom Gaskins’ Cypress Knee Museum

Cypress knees, the part of the cypress tree’s root system not submerged below water, come in a variety of evocative shapes and sizes. The greatest knee poacher of all time was a man named Tom Gaskins, proprietor of the Cypress Knee Museum in Palmdale, Florida. He collected hundreds of knees from 23 states, and held the only US patent on cypress knee manufacture. His collection included one knee that resembled Joseph Stalin and another described as a “lady hippo wearing a Carmen Miranda hat.” Cutting off knees kills the cypress tree, so today, thanks to the Lady Bird Johnson Law, knee poaching is illegal. Gaskins’ collection was destined to be the last of its kind. Unfortunately, following Gaskins’ death in 1998 and a major burglary in 2000, the museum closed.




* Previously in the Proceedings: A Short History of Arborsculpture, The Last Tree of Ténéré, Jokes of Nature
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