Ben Milam Cypress

Trees of this size typically affirm life in these days of dwindling green space, but this tree’s history is about death. What stuck in my mind is that it was known as a sniper tree— a memorable name for a dreadful thought, especially with the regular horror of news stories lighting up my phone notifications. Legend has it that the Mexican army used the tree to take out people coming to the river for water.

As soldiers became disillusioned and began dropping out of the Texas revolution, Colonel Benjamin R. Milam feared that hesitation would kill their momentum. Stepping up, he led a charge of volunteers into the Mexican held Béxar (now the name of the county San Antonio sits in) on Saturday, December 5, 1835.

Hit in the head by a bullet as he entered a courtyard during the fighting, Milam was killed instantly before the battle was won. My 1970 edition states that it was likely that this bald cypress was the vantage point from which an attacker could have fired. The 2015 edition calls it the “platform for the historic assassination.”

We took a bit of a risk making this trip in the first place. Texas reopened from Covid lockdown much sooner than most states, while many others are still quarantining. Since I work in landscaping, which was deemed essential from the beginning, I’ve been out in the world the whole time — wearing a mask, of course.

We attempted activities throughout the weekend: getting food, shopping in an open air market and along with everyone else in our hotel, we tried cooling off in the woefully inadequate rooftop pool a few minutes, but continually retreated back to our room.

Ok so I just turned 50.

This milestone birthday is a big reason I started this project. The first edition of the Famous Trees of Texas was published the year I was born: 1970. Something about seeing that it had been a half century for both of us made me feel like: It’s now or never.

Of course I wanted to commemorate this momentous birthday with another tree trek. We took off Friday afternoon, picked up our friend in Austin and made it to San Antonio in the late evening. Until after we had arrived, I didn’t do a single bit of research on the area trees. I realized that the cluster of dots on my map was more spread out than they appeared. Two turned out to be dead and there is only one left within the city limits. 

Our hotel was right along the main tourist attraction: San Antonio’s river walk. We went right out to see the water as soon as we arrived, admiring numerous bald cypress trees which thrive having their roots in the water.

Our first morning, after we trekked on foot to breakfast, using GPS coordinates (that I had somehow never utilized) and maneuvering around construction blockage, we found the massive Ben Milam Cypress.
Besides multiple Live Oaks and one magnificent Post Oak, the only other species I’ve collected so far is another bald cypress, (Taxodium distichum) called Old Baldy, in McKinney Falls State Park. This one is double trunked and twice as large.

Navigating the sometimes crowded river paths, my friends and I stood under the tree and snapped photos in front of this gigantic specimen, sometimes removing our face coverings for the pictures. Standing close, it’s nearly impossible to get a shot of the whole tree, so there are angles looking up at the branches and those with only the bottom of the fat trunks showing.

Surrounding construction made it difficult to get over to the other side of the riverwalk to get a little distance. I watched a yellow tourist barge floating along past the bend in the river and heard the guide make mention of the historic cypress with his microphone. This tour might’ve been worth taking for the visual perspective, but as we are now living in another moment in history, the proximity to other tourists had little appeal. Thanks, Covid.

The gal pals who joined me on this voyage are close friends since the early 90s. I’m grateful they were willing to travel and celebrate my birthday especially since they’re both good photographers. Shots they took with me in them better display the tree’s enormous size, but they send me into a spiral of self-consciousness. 

The bandana was a make-shift mask, not a fashion statement, btw.

This narrow walkway on the river meant a fair amount of the public was walking by the entire time. Already feeling ill-at-ease during this middle-aged lady photo-shoot, having an audience made it a lot worse. Including photos of myself is a challenging exercise in vulnerability. You’ve undoubtedly seen the multitude of beautiful instagram influencers. I can’t measure up to that.

So yeah. There I am… awkwardly sweating in 100-degree August temperatures: A 50-year-old lady next to a tree.

But you know? THIS IS IT: This is the youngest I’ll ever be again. Must I be perfect — or someone’s idea of perfect — to be on camera?

I’m here. Checking out a tree that is lots older and much larger than I am. Deal with it. (Saying this to myself as much as anyone else).

We made reservations for dinner on the outdoor patio at Supper in the Hotel Emma. Though it was sweltering hot, we chose to walk an hour to get there, which afforded us another tree photo opp.

Covid-wise, the crowd sizes weren’t alarming as they passed quickly, but the general vibe definitely squelched most of the feelings of uplift I might’ve experienced about this particular living thing. Wandering the riverwalk with a frozen margarita in a plastic to-go cup didn’t put me in a mind to summon reverence for battle heroes, sharpshooters or the fight for freedom that this tree symbolizes, but it was nice to get a second viewing.

Sunday morning in the hotel room, we enjoyed a room service breakfast and listened to podcasts while I mapped and took photos of the next trees we would meet on the way home.

Random notes:

Check out this crazy song called The Mexican by 1970s British band, Babe Ruth, with whom I was unfamiliar. 

Shazaming the song when I heard the powerful vocalist Jenny Haan singing the names of Texas heroes (Wait…what???) I looked it up. Wikipedia says that the songwriter, Alan Shacklock wrote it in response to seeing the historically inaccurate John Wayne film called The Alamo. 

Why did we blow off seeing the Alamo?
I was so focused on the group of trees I was hoping to cram into the last day of travel. We made a half-hearted drive-by attempt to see it. Extensive construction blocked our view so we went on our way.